Mirrors: An NCIS-1 story
by briwd
Summary: Sequel to Countdown to Looking Glass. Gibbs and the rest of his NCIS team from Earth-17 have fled the threat of Armageddon for the safety of the familiar and strange world of Earth-1. As the team becomes familiar with its surroundings new threats arise, from the halls of the White House to the streets of Washington, D.C.. New allies within NCIS and the intelligence and metahuman co
1. Chapter 1

**Mirrors**

 **An NCIS-1 Story**

 **Chapter 1**

 **Earth-1**

 _-This is ZNN, and we're interrupting Capitol Hill Today for a major developing story, in which tens of thousands of people are appearing, en masse, throughout the United States through what scientists are saying are 'interdimensional wormholes'—_

 _-FEMA has arrived here in Times Square and in Queens in the parking lot at Citi Field as thousands of people are making their way—_

 _-the President posted on Facebook and Twitter the following statement: 'I am following with great interest this extraordinary event and want to reassure all Americans these people are not threats. In fact they are refugees and need our immediate and ongoing assistance. I urge local and state law enforcement and civilian aid organizations to assist FEMA and the National Guard in all 52 states to help these refugees. As President I have access to information on numerous subjects before anyone else, and I did know about this ahead of time. At my discretion, I informed various local, state and federal agencies to be ready, and I'm elated they're responding as the dedicated professionals they all are. I know you, the American people, have many questions, and I will attempt to answer as many of them as I can at 6 p.m. Eastern time today. Please join me, as I discuss this unusual event and why it is important we reach out to aid these people, our brothers and sisters and, now, our new friends.'—_

 _-GBS affiliate KGSF in San Francisco has just posted an interview with one of the refugees online and is about to air it now on its broadcast feed. There are two things from the interview, which we'll carry live on the GBS network and GBS News24, that are of interest: one, the refugees claim to be from Earth, and two, they claim to be fleeing from impending nuclear war-_

 _-Wonder Woman had no comment when pushed by a WGDC reporter on the developing situation at RFK—_

 _-Jeff, CBS affiliate WBBM in Chicago is going to air an interview with a refugee who refers to himself as Chicago Cubs left fielder Barry Bonds. Barry Bonds has NEVER played for the Cubs-_

 _-Superman has been seen aiding FEMA and Metropolis PD and state National Guard in distributing food and water to refugees here at Centennial Park and also at the Metro Tech football stadium in Brookline. He ignored reporters from WMTR and the Metropolis Post but did offer a brief comment to Daily Planet reporter Lois Lane, which the publication is holding for an eight-page special section that will go to press in ten minutes-_

 **Chapter 1**

 **Tuesday, June 6, 2017**

 **Robert F. Kennedy Stadium**

 **Washington, D.C., United States of America**

 **12:42 p.m. Eastern Daylight Time**

"Boss. We sure as hell ain't in Kansas anymore."

Leroy Jethro Gibbs was in no mood to argue the point with Tony DiNozzo, for the stoic ex-Marine was still trying to make sense of his surroundings.

The Special Agent-in-Charge of the Naval Criminal Intelligence Service's Major Case Response Team stood next to his team's Senior Special Agent (and his second-in-command) and looked around. They both knew one thing for sure: this was not the Earth they had lived their entire lives on.

"Looks like they've set up a giant FEMA camp here at RFK, Boss," DiNozzo said. Gibbs had already spotted a few volunteers with badges identifying themselves as part of the Federal Emergency Management Association, a federal agency that normally ran point on the U.S. government's response to natural disasters.

"Tens of thousands of refugees in a stadium calls for FEMA to be there, DiNozzo," Gibbs said. Both men stood on a platform that they knew to be behind one of the end zones for Washington Redskins games at the stadium. Gibbs held his binoculars up and looked hard at the scoreboard, the video screen, and the advertisements on the other side of the stadium.

"We know one thing, Boss: they sure have another RFK," DiNozzo said as he looked around the stadium. It was a carbon copy of the stadium he and Gibbs had both watched a game and worked a case in. He waited while Gibbs slowly scanned the stadium with the binoculars before speaking up. "Here's something you'll want to know: it's 2017."

"You mean 2007."

"No, Boss. A couple of those FEMA workers said it's _2017_. They didn't come across as dumb and definitely not the types to get the year wrong…was that thing some sort of time machine too, Boss?"

"I don't know, Tony. That's one more question on my already-long list, and I want answers."

"You and me both, Boss. We're not going to find them here."

" _Some_ of them _are_ here, DiNozzo."

"Probably…you itching to get out of here as much as I am?"

"Yeah. We start by finding out why we're _here_ , Tony, and not at the Pentagon," Gibbs replied. "That part I'm still having trouble with."

"Me too," DiNozzo said. He and everyone else on the floor of the Pentagon Mall 'Ring' complex on their Earth – codenamed Earth-17 – had apparently walked, driven or ridden through two wormholes: the first that took them to this Earth-1, and a second, local wormhole that took them across Washington to RFK Stadium. "Boss, maybe McGee can make heads or tails of this. This is the kind of thing he watches on TV."

Gibbs had just found the rest of their team – the bulk of the group was on the field, and Special Agent Kate Todd and Federal Bureau of Investigation Agent Tobias Fornell had split off, heading towards the platform where he and DiNozzo were. "He's probably as much in the dark as we are, DiNozzo."

"We need to find someone in charge," DiNozzo replied.

"Ya think?!"

DiNozzo took that as a sign to start looking. "Great idea, Boss. I'll go—"

Gibbs grabbed DiNozzo's upper arm to stop him. "Not yet. Wait." He nodded towards Kate and Fornell, who both walked past a stadium security officer.

Kate ran ahead of Fornell, getting to Gibbs and DiNozzo several seconds ahead of the older FBI agent. "God, I'm so glad you made it, Gibbs," she said. "You were the only one missing, and some of us were worried."

"No need to have been, Kate," Gibbs said. "Everyone's accounted for, then?"

"Yeah," Fornell said as he caught up to the trio. "We need to find who's in charge here."

"Either of you have any idea of who that might be?" Gibbs asked.

"Someone's in charge, but the FEMA people and the volunteers aren't talking," Kate said. "I think they're a bit overwhelmed, anyway."

"Too many refugees," Fornell added, gesturing to the mostly full seats across RFK Stadium. Some people were eating boxed lunches, many were drinking bottled water. Many others were pointing towards the Justice League/Redskins advertisement next to the video screen, which was now showing one of the GBS anchors talking with a reporter. "You both saw that Redskins ad up there," Fornell continued. "Everyone's looking at it."

"Who are they?", Gibbs asked.

"A couple of volunteers called them the Justice League," Kate replied. "Names like Superman. Wonder Woman. Zah-Tana. Red Tornado."

"Like the people we met on my front porch earlier today," Gibbs said.

"Yeah," Kate replied.

"It reminds me of one of the _G-Men_ movies," DiNozzo added.

"G-Men, DiNutso?", Fornell said, pronouncing DiNozzo's last name in his distinct way. "As in the _FBI_?"

"No, not _those_ G-Men. _The G-Men_. _G-Men, G2, G-Men: Do or Die._ Patrick Stewart, Famke Janssen, Hugh Jackman?"

The movie references went over the others' heads, but DiNozzo pushed his point.

"They're from Major Comics…ever read The Future Family? The Retaliators? The CrUSAder? Machineman? The _Bug_ – you know, Tobey Maguire as The Bug! You never saw _The Bug? The Bug 2? The Bug 3?_ "

Kate rolled her eyes, while Fornell groaned. Gibbs stared at DiNozzo, but not with his usual 'get to the point, knock off the nonsense' manner. "NC."

"Gibbs?", she said.

"They remind me of the old National Comics – of a guy named Hyperman. Another comic, Miss America. They were popular when I was growing up."

"Then everyone started reading Major Comics," DiNozzo said. "Those people up there aren't comic-book characters, though. They're the local heroes."

"And they're real," Fornell added. "Flying men and women. Bullets bouncing off your chest like they're nothing. Imagine all that power in one human being."

"Oh God," Kate said. "If there are super _heroes_ , that means there are super _villains_."

"McGee's already brought _that_ point up," Fornell said.

"No use in arguing it right now," Gibbs said, in the no-nonsense, stern tone the others were well-acquainted with. "We need to find out where we are, who's in charge, and how to get out of here, after we rejoin the others."

 **12:49 p.m. EDT**

 **RFK Stadium field**

"Here. Take this," said the smiling brunette who couldn't keep herself from gawking at Abby Sciuto while handing over a bottled water and boxed lunch. "It's not much. They'll tell you more in an hour."

"Thanks," Abby said, taking both the bottle and the box. "Are 'they' the people in charge?"

"Yeah," the young, 20-something brunette replied.

Abby thought she looked a lot like the engineer from that Joss Whedon sci-fi show who McGee liked so much. She almost called the stranger Kaylee twice, and figured she needed a name to put with the person. "Uh, you have a name?"

"Oh yeah. Me," the woman said, suddenly looking like she had to get somewhere very quickly.

"'Me'?"

"Yea—oh boy. Sorry. Katie."

"Abby. I have a friend named Katie, too, only we call her Kate—"

"IknowyournameandknowaboutKatetoo—" Katie froze, as if she had just broken a cardinal law of her employer: Don't Let Them Make You. If the other woman was as sharp as Katie thought she was, then Katie had already been made…for something. "Sorry. Gotta go. Other people to help. Just wait. They'll make an announcement soon. I promise. Gotta go – bye bye!"

Abby watched as Katie took off in a dead heat towards the main grandstand and thought about running after her. _How does she know me and Kate…is she another refugee-_

"Abby!"

Only after Ziva shouted in her ear and McGee waved his hands frantically in her face, did Abby tear her attention from the young woman to her two teammates. "Sorry, guys. I got distracted."

"I'll say," McGee replied. "I saw her, too. We thought she was one of these FEMA people—"

"She _is_ , McGee."

"I saw her talking with you as well," Ziva added. "I kept my eyes on her but lost her in the crowd. Why would she run? Did she threaten you?"

"Threaten…no. No, no, no. She didn't threaten me at all. She said she knew me. And Kate. I've never met her, McGee, though I can't speak for Kate."

"Abigail?"

The trio turned around and saw Dr. Donald "Ducky" Mallard making his way towards them, stopping a foot away from Abby. "Abigail, I saw the very end of your conversation with that FEMA worker. Is everything alright?"

"Ducky, I don't know," Abby replied. "She said she knew me and Kate."

"Could she perhaps have journeyed over here with the rest of us?"

"No. She said she's working for FEMA," Abby said. "It was like she said something she shouldn't have, got caught, and ran away in a panic."

"In that type of situation, the person usually becomes a person of interest at the very least, and we pursue them until we catch up with them," Ziva said. "I lost her in the crowd. That tells me she may be well-trained at evasion."

"Ziva, you're not saying she's a criminal, are you?" McGee replied. "I'm really curious now, but she's a FEMA worker. If she didn't threaten Abby, she didn't do anything wrong."

"Not 'wrong', Timothy," Ducky added. "So far, she's only guilty of talking with Abigail; giving her a bottle of water and a box full of food; and prematurely ending a conversation after blurting out she knows two people who, theoretically, she shouldn't know at all. She's certainly piqued the curiosity of two trained investigators, a scientist and a humble medical examiner, but she's committed no crime."

"I did not mean to suggest she had commited an actual crime," Ziva said. "I merely meant to suggest that she may be more than a mere 'FEMA worker'. _Much_ more."

 **1:03 p.m. EDT**

 **RFK Stadium Press Box**

After flashing her identification badge and name dropping two of her superiors to the DC Metro policemen guarding the entrance to the press box, Katie made her way inside and looked for a suite with a view of the field. She wanted to keep eyes on the 'suspects', without them seeing her again – without _him_ seeing her at all.

She pulled out her iCom and began contacting her superior in every possible manner she knew. Facebook poke. Tweet. Instagram. Text message. E-mail, since the federal government still heavily used it.

Katie remembered her superior was old-school – and would have his own iCom, or maybe his Galaxy, with him. The same number went to both devices, and so she called him, as she kept her eyes on the field until she found the people she was looking for.

 _Oh my God,_ she thought, as she adjusted her iWear to zoom in on the crowd. _They look younger from the last time we saw them, too. Maybe…no…no. No way. She's there._

 _They have to be a different group._

 _If so…what does that MEAN? Is that – are THEY – why the President's doing what he's doing?_

She heard someone pick up. "Agent Stewart."

"Marcus. It's Katie. I'm so, so sorry to bother you. It's something…something big."

 **1:10 p.m. EDT**

 **The White House**

 **Situation Room**

The President listened intently to his Secretary of State, Elizabeth McCord, explain the Russian and Chinese government's positions on the 'extraordinary event' that was occurring in their countries, along with virtually every other country on Earth.

"They're not going to war, if you're worried about that," McCord said. "The Russian Ambassador wants to know if we'll share intel or if he should ask his country's Khundish friends for even more assistance than they're kindly giving them."

"I'll speak with my counterpart in Moscow shortly," the Commander-in-Chief said, "after I speak to our counterpart in Beijing and to the NATO leaders. Elizabeth, what I need to know from you first, not from ZNN or GBS, is the reaction of some of the more…unstable…countries to this event."

"Qurac is warehousing their 'refugees' in the stadiums they're using for next year's World Cup soccer tournament," McCord said. "Albania tried to send them back, even after the wormhole closed. We're still trying to get a read on what's going on Pyongyang."

"Keep at it, especially with the North Koreans, and if Langley gives you any static, call me personally," the President replied. "General, we're still at DEFCON 3?"

"In the Arabian Sea, outside the Korean Peninsula and in the Indian Ocean," said General Samuel Lane, United States Army and the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. "We've got fighters and bombers ready at the South African bases in Bloemspruit and Durban ready to roll, should Grodd decide to use the occasion to provoke the Sudanese or the DRC."

"Grodd's made a lot of enemies throughout Africa, Mr. President," said the Vice-President. "We really could use Solovar."

"No one can find him," said Andrew Munsey, the Director of the Central Intelligence Agency. "Not the Justice League. Not us."

"Keep looking," the President said. "We have bigger fish to fry right now, here at home. Caroline, how are things with the refugees?"

"Suprisingly calm, sir," said Caroline Harp, Director of FEMA. "There were some fights in Los Angeles, Detroit, Atlanta, Omaha, but the refugees helped the National Guard calm the belligerents."

"'Calm' them? I have a report" – the President pulled out a sheet from a folder laying in front of him, on the table he and the others in the room sat at – "that says 'a large man identifying himself as 'United States Air Force Captain Clifford Zmeck' nearly beat six gang members to death before being subdued by Guardsmen and SWAT members from the Los Angeles Police Department. There is a Clifford Zmeck we know of who was in the Air Force and is waiting his turn in the chair for rape and murder."

"Those incidents are, thankfully, few and far between, Mr. President. Most of these people are sweethearts."

"And how well are we doing at feeding these 'sweethearts', Ms. Harp?"

"Your corporation's agricultural subsidiary has been extremely cooperative at providing food, water and medicine from its farms and its supermarket and pharmaceutical subsidiaries, Mr. President."

"And they said it was a bad idea for a sitting President to keep his businesses," the President replied. "Anything else?"

No one spoke. The President rose from his chair, and everyone else stood. "Come with me," the President said to the Vice-President. "We've got business to discuss."

With the Secret Service shadowing their every move, the President and the Vice-President left the Situation Room and walked briskly towards the Oval Office.

"Any word on my counterpart and his people?", the President said.

"John Boehner and his people are at Andrews," said Vice-President Franklin 'Frank' Rock. The President of the United States of Earth-17, his family, his staff and some of his Secret Service detail were currently at Joint Base Andrews in nearby Prince George County, Maryland. "They're being debriefed, and fed, before we transport them here."

"Remember, he's a dignitary, and the President of an America. Not _this_ America, and certainly not _me_. But as a visiting President from another America, he'll be treated with the respect he deserves. He just led his country through a horrific war, and part of him probably wanted to stay behind."

"From what he told me on the phone, his detail didn't give him the option of falling on his sword," Rock said. "If it had been me, sir, I would have wanted the same."

"I understand completely, Frank," said President Alexander 'Lex' Luthor. "I want to talk with the other President myself before I go before the cameras. There are other pressing concerns, though, that we need to discuss."

"The Justice League."

"No, not them, not now. I'm speaking of the task force my predecessor set up that destroyed her career last summer…"

 **1:11 p.m. EDT**

 **22,300 miles above Washington, D.C.**

 **The Justice League of America's satellite headquarters**

From the half-mile-long, half-mile-wide facility's observation room, it was possible to see representations of America's past, present and future.

One could see the East Coast of the United States on Earth, of course, along with Armstrong City and the U.S. military and scientific bases on the surface of the moon. If the USS Ronald Reagan or the USS Constitution orbital naval carriers were in the area, one could see them, along with the hundreds of other American- and other national military and civilian facilities and ships in orbit. The vast Trump Orbital Plaza above New York City and the SpaceX Orbital Station above Texas were easily visible, as were the USAF and civilian orbital planes (especially PanAm, United and Delta) flying from or to the surface, and the private orbital yachts still available only to multimillionaires and billionaires like Richard Branson, Elon Musk, Donald Trump and Bruce Wayne. If one looked way in the distance, the recently completed Lewis & Clark O'Neil space colony was visible, sitting in the 'L5' position relative to the Earth and moon.

Space was a busy place, and even though the Justice League Satellite was closed to the public, that didn't keep those who could from gawking at the facility. The core of the satellite was a spherical hub with a thick torus around its center, connected to the central sphere by eight thick spokes. No one knew what was inside the facility, except for the glass-encased observation room atop the hub; it was clear the observation room was for decoration only, and the real business of the Justice League was conducted out of sight.

That was the fiction the JLA wanted the world to believe. An elaborate holographic system hid the League's business on the observation deck from the outside world, whether it was talking strategy around the conference table, or its annual Christmas party or the occasions when it entertained metahumans from alternate realities. The U.S. military and government – not to mention other countries – still hadn't penetrated the holographic illusion, and considering who was currently in the White House, JLA security was more important than ever.

At the moment, two members of the so-called 'Satellite League' – there were two other Leagues currently in operation out of Detroit and Washington, and there was the special forces group labeled the 'Batman League' by the Gotham-based media – were standing on the observation desk. Video monitors from every American news channel available – including GBS; ZNN; CBS; NBC/msnbc/CNBC; CNN; FOX/Fox News; CNC; ABC; Bloomberg; CBN News; OneAmerica; Sinclair; and (the mistrusted) LexNews, along with local stations from the Leaguers' home cities and other major cities like Chicago and Houston – were on floating plasma screens. Smaller monitors, accessing websites from major news organizations (like The New York Times and The Daily Planet) and social media (such as Twitter) were constantly updating. The Leaguers had their own sources for breaking news, but knowing what the mainstream media was saying up to the moment was very helpful in their line of work, and especially given what was happening right now.

"They have no idea how many people have walked through those wormholes, Diana," said Green Lantern. John Stewart was part of what amounted to an intergalactic police corps numbering in the thousands, and the primary (but not only) Lantern assigned to Earth. Stewart, a former architect, was notable as both the first hero to publicly announce his secret identity to the world, and as one of the first African-Americans in a small, mainly Caucasian, clique.

Stewart looked at his ring, which could, in layman's terms, do just about anything one asked it to do, but had to be recharged every 24 hours and was vulnerable to anything colored yellow (Stewart and the other Lanterns had long ago learned to defend themselves against the likes of yellow power-ring wielders, or individuals armed with yellow-colored bullets). "Those news channels have no idea how many people are down there. They're talking in terms of five figures, way, way too low."

"What is your ring saying?", asked Diana, also known as Wonder Woman. The so-called Ambassador to 'Man's World' from the hidden-until-recently island of Themyscria, Wonder Woman's uniform bore the colors of the U.S. flag, and the distinct yellow of her people's kingdom. Among the first of the superheroes to emerge, Wonder Woman was intelligent, beautiful and a powerful force to be reckoned with.

"2,117,066," Green Lantern said. "I bet the ring isn't the only one who knows that, either. You think he'll do the right thing by them, Diana?"

"Luthor? He'll have to. And to be fair to him – which, given what he know about him, can be quite a challenge – he has been a competent executive so far."

"So far. Neither of us can trust him as far as we can throw him. And I know neither of them don't," Green Lantern said, sticking his thumb out and gesturing behind him.

Wonder Woman turned around and saw two of her long-time friends, and colleagues, walking off the League's transporters. To the left was Superman, based in Metropolis, who grew up as a human but had long been open about being one of the last survivors of the now-destroyed planet of Krypton. Superman was handsome by all accounts, the most powerful being on Earth, and the sitting President of the United States had topped his list of enemies for years. To the right was the mysterious Batman, who patrolled and protected Gotham as its Dark Knight and Darknight Detective and had been the League's prime strategist and investigator before splitting recently to form his own group of heroes.

"He's _up_ to something, Diana," Superman said. "I can feel it in my gut."

"I've come to the same conclusion," Batman added. "We need to combine forces."

"Arthur's not going to agree," Wonder Woman replied, speaking of Aquaman, who formed his own League of young heroes who could commit full-time to the organization, and based it in the first city that offered him what he wanted in a headquarters, location and facilities – Detroit, Michigan. "It'll take a Crisis to get him working with us, again."

"Arthur won't turn his back on those folks," Green Lantern said. "Neither will Luthor."

"No he won't," Batman said. "As long as it suits him, and as long as the eyes of the world are on him. Right now, our two groups need to work together."

"What about the new League in Washington?", Wonder Woman replied.

"I'm working on that," Batman replied. "Still vetting Lord."

"Let me work on that," Wonder Woman said. "Kal, can you talk to the Titans if we need them?"

"Of course," Superman said, his attention clearly divided.

"Penny for your thoughts, Kal?" Wonder Woman replied. "Luthor?"

"He's _not_ the only one I'm worried about," Superman said. "Earth-17's begun its nuclear exchange, and it may be over by now—"

"We're waiting to hear from Captain Comet," Batman said. "We also have access to the CIA database, from their own agents who are in that universe."

"Do I want to know how we have access to the CIA database, Batman?", Green Lantern asked.

The Dark Knight grunted.

"So, Kal, you are concerned about some type of invasion from Earth-1?", Wonder Woman asked.

"No. The military and governments have that covered. Earthside, in Washington, a team of NCIS agents walked through the wormhole when it opened less than an hour ago—"

"It couldn't be the team from four years ago that showed up," Green Lantern said. "It'd have to be their counterparts from Earth-17…damn. You know what kind of ruckus that's going to stir up?"

"It definitely isn't the previous team, John," Wonder Woman replied. "The federal government made certain they would not ever come back and J'onn wiped their memories of our world. The federal government from Earth-Prime has protocols in place so they couldn't come over, again, and so their world wouldn't be threatened by him…or by Luthor or any other threat."

"But if he finds out?", Green Lantern said.

" _When_ he finds out," Batman said. "We _are_ talking about a man who is former Mossad and former Task Force X, who double-crossed everyone he worked for. He murdered a team in cold blood, assassinated a sitting President, and was directly responsible for the deaths of over two million people almost 12 years ago. We are talking about a man who neither we nor the United States government can touch right now because he's been given diplomatic immunity."

 **The Arabian Peninsula**

 **Ra's al Ghul Compound**

 **9:18 p.m. Makkah Saudi Arabia Time / 1:18 p.m. EDT**

It is one of the smallest countries on Earth, about 500 meters smaller than Vatican City in Europe – and is perhaps the most watched.

American, Russian, Chinese, British, French, Israeli and Saudi satellites watch the compound constantly. Drones from those and 17 other nations fly – with Saudi permission – nonstop, near the compound, but never over its airspace. To do so would be to provoke the 'Demon's Head' into war.

And, perhaps, to provoke the Son of the Demon into further mayhem.

For almost twelve years, Ari Haswari has sought shelter in the one place that will provide it to him. Ra's al Ghul is the one man who has never used him, but treated him like family, and Ari has rewarded his loyalty by undergoing periodic one-man missions, eliminating threats to Ra's.

The Dark Knight has not been one of them, and truth be told, Ari would like nothing than to never go back to America, especially with a death sentence awaiting him.

However…if the news reports are right…a very good reason to leave the compound and risk his freedom has just been granted him.

If _they_ are alive…if _they_ have returned from the grave…his mission is not yet finished.

Ari would deal with Talia, if it came to it, and if necessary he had to knew how to put away the Demon's Head permanently.

He couldn't rely on satellite and internet news. He needed to know first-hand if they were alive.

Ari Haswari _had_ to return to America.


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter 2**

 _Sometimes, when one person is absent,_

 _the whole world seems depopulated._

—Allphonse de Lamartine

 **Tuesday, June 6, 2017**

 **Near Woolsey, Virginia, United States of America**

 **2:55 p.m. Eastern Daylight Time**

Marcus Stewart loved his job.

As the Special Agent in Charge of the Major Case Response Team at the Washington field office for the Naval Criminal Investigative Service, the former Navy SEAL loved playing action hero, detective, cop, boss and mentor. He loved bringing bastards to justice and, where possible, putting those bastards back on the road to redemption. He loved pushing his body to be as fit as a man half his age and pushing his mind to be sharper than anyone else.

Yet, when the African-American/Samoan 'action hero' took time off, to the surprise of many he often spent it on a Sunday drive.

Stewart, a Cleveland native chronologically in his mid-40s, drove his electric Jeep through rural Virginia. The audio player was off, his phone was in sleep mode, and his watch was set to show only the time and temperature and, if a case broke, set to flash every second until he answered the call from NCIS or whatever law enforcement agency needed his and his team's services.

He hoped everyone could do without him for the rest of the afternoon.

The drives along the quiet two-lane country roads and the endless acres of trees and grass helped scrub away the garbage and frustration that would build up from his job. The political snake pits he had to navigate through, the scum he came across way too often on both sides of the law, the pissing matches with other federal and civilian agencies he and his team sometimes got dragged into, all built up until Stewart had to get out of the city.

From the time he was a major college football recruit, Stewart would leave the city and its problems behind every so often, to get out in the country to clear his head. It had served him well, so far, and he saw no reason to stop now. Not even a hard workout, or an hour's session on one of the vintage video game arcade games in his basement, could clear out the crap and focus his mind quite like Mother Nature.

Still, Stewart kept his phone close by. When duty called — be it the all-too-common dead body in Rock Creek Park, or a summons to the director's office, or the occasional call from a fellow law enforcement officer outside of town — Stewart had to be ready to answer.

As he drove down the James Madison Parkway, also known as US Highway 15, Stewart looked out for a familiar stop as he entered the outskirts of the town of Woolsey.

Ever since Stewart moved to Washington in 2005, Woolsey had outgrown its small-town roots to become yet another bedroom suburb within the sprawling, heavily-populated Washington-Baltimore metropolitan area. Woolsey, however, had laws in place limiting the sprawl to protect as much of the countryside as possible. At the intersection he had just pulled up to, there were only five businesses — 7-Eleven, Big Belly Burger, Starbucks, Jiffy Lube and Walgreen's — all close together. On his right, he saw a Sunoco, a Sundollar's and a Panera Bread being built next to the Walgreen's and Jiffy Lube.

He headed left, then pulled his Jeep up to one of the battery refilling stations at 7-Eleven. He hooked the large cable to the vehicle's charging outlet, and walked inside, greeting the two women at the register as he entered.

"How you been, stranger?", asked the older lady, Madeline, a plus-sized, petite woman with a supremely extroverted personality who had never met a stranger in her life. "Been a while since you made your way out here. You been busy?"

"Better believe it," Stewart said as he poured some half-and-half in his coffee cup. Black coffee, having been a taste he hadn't quite acquired, went down a lot easier with cream and sweetener. "We just wrapped up a case. It felt great to get outside of the city for a change. It's been a gorgeous day."

"Hasn't it been?", Madeline said, as she made her way over to the coffee area, grabbing four packets of Splenda. "Don't forget these," she said, putting them down on the counter next to Stewart's cup.

"Wouldn't think of it," he replied, picking up the packets and tearing them open, then pouring the contents into his cup. "I tried that Styse stuff last time."

"The sweetener from Rann? Ugh," she said, making an exaggerated grossed-out face that made Stewart chuckle. "Honey, 30 years and we're still giving them more than they've given us."

"Really? People are living longer and are healthier. Technology's skyrocketed. We're traveling the stars now because of them."

"Yeah, honey, and we're sending them our blue jeans, reality shows and Lord knows what else with us. You know what? Maybe somebody will get some common sense, and put all those politicians on a ship and send them all there and leave them."

"Now come on, Miss Maddie. Would _you_ do that to your friends?"

Madeline and Stewart shared a laugh, and she walked with him as he picked up a ham and cheese sandwich and an apple. "Marcus, you doin' alright?"

Stewart stopped and turned to the woman whom had been one of his mentors after he moved to D.C. more than 12 years ago. "I'm fine," he said, although she didn't fully believe him.

"Define 'fine'," she said, in her calm, 'tell me how things are _really_ going for you' tone of voice.

"Team's doing alright, all the drama's on the Hill. You askin' about Gabriel Hicks?"

"I'm asking about _you_. You and Julie."

"It's complicated."

"She 'Rule 12' you again?"

Stewart sighed. He had gone for a drive to put that ongoing matter out of his mind for a while. "Like I said, Maddie, it's complicated."

"You two need to work it out," Madeline said. "You're good for her and she's good for you."

"Tell _her_ that," Stewart said in a near-whisper, hoping the young girl at the counter hadn't heard any of the conversation. Stewart was a private man, and wished to keep his — and his team's — business close to the vest.

"Give her time. She's been through a lot, too. What that bastard did to Ron affected her—"

"It affected us _all_. He's a fighter. He'll survive. She will, too."

"Yes, with time and a little space. I would have thought all those years of experience would have taught you that."

"Every single day I wake up, I realize that there's a lot I don't know squat about and always something new to learn. I…relationships don't come natural to me. Running down the street, chasing after some bastard like Hicks, running a crazed Marine off the road, rescuing a kid or damsel in distress? Playing action hero, that's _me_. That comes naturally. Relationships? I've _always_ had to work at that."

"Welcome to the club, Marcus," Madeline said. "Frank and I love each other dearly, and we're gonna die together, but we have to work at our relationship. You give of yourself. You talk to your partner. You _never_ take things for granted. Every couple's relationships have their ups and downs. Stick with it. Stick with her."

Stewart decided there was nothing he could say in response to the woman who had been like an aunt to him for the past dozen years. He also decided that thinking about the woman whom he had loved longer wasn't going to lead anywhere but to a place of frustration, and this impromptu drive was about clearing his psyche. He took his coffee, sandwich and fruit to the register, paid with his smartphone, and went on his way. Madeline knew where, and how, to reach him if she wanted to follow up, and he knew she inevitably would do so.

He looked up at the blank 8K HDTV screen near the entrance that usually had on a news channel, or a talk show, or a ball game. "TV's on the fritz?"

"It's a cheap ol' TV we got from Wal-Mart. Bo" – the local 7-Eleven franchisee – "paid 200 bucks for it. It went out yesterday. I told him to get something better; I think he's at Costco looking for a 300 dollar screen."

"You know what they say, Miss Maddie. 'You get what you pay for'. Probably aren't missing anything, anyway. You see one Dr. Phil episode, you've seen them all."

"And you see one talking head on Fox or Luthor's news channel, you've seen them all," Madeline said, as she reached up to give Stewart a hug. "Go enjoy yourself, Marcus. Go see a movie."

"Not a bad idea," Stewart said, before telling her she'd send her and her husband a text later on. He got back on the road and considered driving on to Catharpin, but his gut told him to go south into Haymarket, towards the Interstate. He reasoned that maybe he could finally catch the _Retaliators: Infinitude War_ movie in 360 degree, 16K 3D; he'd always liked Robert Downey Jr. as Machinehead. That alone would be worth the $30 matinee ticket.

His watch flashed and his phone buzzed. On the third buzz, Stewart quickly pulled off the side of the road and pulled into the back of a Giant Food parking lot.

"Stewart."

"Marcus. It's Katie." Katherine 'Katie' Yates, the Chief Forensics Scientist of NCIS since 2008, was as close to Stewart as a sister and brother could be, and she never bothered him on his days off unless it was to hang out with him, or unless she had to.

"What's going on?"

"Are you here in Washington?"

"No. I'm outside the city."

"You gotta get here now."

"Katie, you okay? You in danger?"

"I'm at RFK Stadium, on that thing they recruited me for, and I'm fine. They're probably listening in on me but it's all over the news. There's something you and Julie need to see."

"What's all over the news, Booger?" 'Booger' was his nickname for the thirty-something woman whose expertise was highly sought after by those inside and outside NCIS. "There a case?"

"There _will_ be," Katie replied, after a long pause. "Do you have your audio player on?"

"Off. Tell me what's going on?" Katie told Stewart about the rings appearing all over the nation and, now, the world. "Okay, but what's going on at RFK?"

"Oh God, Marcus, I bet they want to keep it secret—"

"But you called me."

"Yeah, I did, right? Ohmigod, I'm going to be in trouble with Maurice. The DEO—"

"You let _me_ worry about him. And about the DEO," Stewart said. "Tell me what you saw there."

"It's them, Marcus. I have eyes on them. I'm in one of the DC United suites. They're in the stadium-."

"Who's 'them'?"

" _Them_."

"You gotta give me a little more than that, Booger."

"Gibbs. His team. They're like 60 feet away from me on the other side of the street."

"That's impossible," Stewart said. "Take a picture."

"Hold on," she said. Under a half-minute later he got a text with a photo attached; he tapped on the attachment and spent the next minute looking closely at each individual in the picture.

 _What in Hell am I looking at?_ , he pondered, looking more closely at the people in the photo. _That was four years ago. There's no way they could've come back here. They set it up so that they couldn't get back here._

"They're younger, Marcus," Katie said.

Gibbs was in the photo, along with DiNozzo, McGee, Sciuto, Mallard and Palmer. The blond-haired woman who was there last time — Bishop, the one whose death still haunted Stewart and the rest of his team — wasn't.

He looked again. Another man, as old as Gibbs, but balding, had FBI written all over him. There was a familiar-looking woman and child on either side of him. An older woman, being held up by a college-aged woman, were behind them.

He looked in the crowd behind them. _Stan? Stan Burley? And is that Mike Franks? What the hell?_

Then, there were the two women near Gibbs. Recogizing both, Stewart felt as if he had just been shot in the gut with a taser. _His_ sister. And, Julie's sister… _her_.

" _She's_ there, Marcus," Katie said, as if she had been reading his mind. "Oh my gosh, Julie's gonna freak—"

"Katie," he said, in the tone he used when his excitable forensics analyst got too excitable, "tell me again what — _who_ — you see."

"Okay," she said, calmly enough. "I see most of the people we met four years ago…hey. I see that lady."

"What lady?"

"Diane Templeton. Remember that case a few years ago? She didn't know anywhere else to go. We talked in the lab. She had a teenage daughter who wanted to be a federal agent. Ms. Templeton said she wanted her to be an executive, or a lawyer—"

"Katie. You see a kid with these people?"

"Yeah. Holding the guy's hand. She looks, nine? I dunno… _OH MY GOD_. That's the father."

"Fornell," Stewart whispered. Ron Sacks had often mentioned Tobias Fornell over the years.

"Ms. Templeton's ex-husband," Katie replied.

"Would the girl be…his daughter? But why is Templeton with them?"

"What if…Marcus, what if she's not Templeton? Not the one we've met, anyway."

"What if those aren't the people we met before?", he said. "Someone else. What world did you say those people in the stadium were from?"

"Earth-17, I think, or that's what the scuttlebutt says. Not that the FEMA people running this thing are saying anything."

"Katie, I'll call Julie, and then Brooke; they're closer to you than I am right now," Stewart said. "I'm headed there now, but I'll have to call in a favor. Traffic's already starting to get bad."

"The rush hour."

"Yeah. You stay out in the open, too. That's an order."

"I don't think anyone here wants to—"

"That's an order. Go out the front, and through the stands. Stay out in public, and get to where midfield is in the lower stands. "

"Okay," she said. "Marcus. What if _they_ find me.?What if they want to talk to me? Do I ignore them?"

"If they see you and want to talk to you, then talk to them. Make _them_ come to _you_. Talk to them. Might be one of the only chances we get…if they're who we think they are. You stay on the line with me while I make my other calls"

Stewart sped onto the Interstate 66 straight into rush hour on a Tuesday afternoon. Pulling onto the on-ramp, he pushed a button that called up the AAA map of the area with traffic patterns; the immediate area showed normal traffic, and heavier traffic around Bull Run National Park. After calling his Senior Special Agent and SSA-in-Training, Stewart realized he probably would have to make another call for extraction.

"I'm calling Julie now," he said to Katie. "She's not picking up."

 **3:15 p.m.**

 **Washington, D.C.**

 **Navy Yard**

William Coburn Jr., Commander in the United States Navy, was content.

For years he had worked for NCIS as its only special agent in charge who also was still on active duty in the military. His team, based out of Camp Lejeune in North Carolina, had just brought down an international ring trafficking Rannian drugs and technology. The ringleader, a rogue Marine Sergeant assigned to Camp Lejeune, was taken down with help from the so-called 'New' Teen Titans. Coburn wasn't thrilled with some of the Titans' tactics – especially when it meant some of the evidence might be thrown out due to the newer members' ignorance of handling crime scenes – but was grateful for their assistance. Without the aid of the veteran hero Nightwing and the rookie heroine Kole, Marine Sgt. Frank Laminski would still be peddling alien medicine and tech.

Coburn and his team – almost all of whom still had their Navy or Marine commissions, the one civilian being a former Boston police officer – were in Washington to meet with President Luthor and the Secretary of the Navy, Sarah Porter. After Luthor paraded them (in Coburn's view) through the Rose Garden, Coburn would discuss details with Porter and the NCIS Director, Maurice Drake. Coburn didn't know Drake very well – he had worked primarily with Michael Larkin, the current Deputy Director – but understood Drake to be a competent, no-nonsense administrator.

And he also knew his good friends, Marcus Stewart and Julie Todd, swore by Drake, just as they had Drake's two predecessors.

The President's dog-and-pony show had been rescheduled for tomorrow; all Coburn knew when he got the text on his Compaq Phone was 'something's come up'. Whatever it was, Drake told Coburn and his team to not worry about it, and enjoy the day off. So, Coburn had gone to nearby Nationals Park to watch the hometown Nationals beat Coburn's adopted team, the Charlotte Knights, 3 to 2. Not only had Stephen Strasburg struck out a season-high 16 batters, he threw out the National League's leader in stolen bases, Billy Hamilton, at home to end the game.

He reminded himself it was just that – a game – and he took his time walking from Nationals Park to the Navy Yard along the Anacostia RiverWalk Trail. It was beautiful and well-maintained, and the warm, sunny day made the walk all the more enjoyable. It seemed like no time at all before Coburn arrived at the Navy Yard's Anacostia Gate. He flashed his badge and was let right in, telling the guard he would walk to NCIS Headquarters.

Lost in his thoughts, Coburn wondered about the rest of his team, off elsewhere in the city. One member – Remy Gautreau, a Navy SEAL he had just gotten back from the New Orleans field office – should be in the building, shadowing members of the local MCRT. He decided to order her to take the rest of the day off, while he wandered around the facility. For all of the years Coburn had been an NCIS agent, he hadn't been here often, so he would make the most of his time here.

Coburn was so lost in his thoughts, though, he didn't notice the statue near the employees' entrance until he almost walked straight into it. He rebuked himself for not paying enough attention, then started to walk around it before realizing what the statue was.

He stepped back several feet, looked up at the nine figures atop the statue's base, and then looked at the inscription. 

_May 25, 2005-June 3, 2005_

 _In Memoriam_

 _Leroy Jethro Gibbs_

 _Thomas Morrow_

 _Caitlin Rose Todd_

 _Anthony DiNozzo Jr._

 _Timothy Aloysius McGee_

 _Donald 'Ducky" Mallard_

 _Abigail Sciuto_

 _James Palmer_

 _Ziva David_

 _They gave their lives fighting so others may live_

Coburn realized that he was looking up at _that_ statue.


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter 3**

 _Good men must die, but death cannot kill their names._

-Unknown

 **3:15 p.m.**

 **Silver Spring, Maryland, U.S.A.**

 _WOOF WOOF WOOF_

 _WOOF WOOF WOOF_

 _WOOF WOOF WOOF_

Juliana Fern Todd _was_ sound asleep on her couch.

The Senior Special Agent for NCIS's Major Case Response Team based out of the Navy Yard was supposed to be taking the day off. The NCIS Chief Psychologist called it her mental health day; Julie told anyone who asked "it'll be my Me day. Just me, a nice glass of wine, a warm bubbly bath and my kids to keep me company."

Her Me day started with a broken water pipe, followed by her four four-legged canine 'kids' running four blocks down the street (she caught up to them another block away) and by a weirdo who insisted on talking to her about the benefits of the Vulcan IDIC (Julie has always been Team Star Wars, not Team Trek). Julie's Day From Hell continued with her alarm system going off accidentally (the cat tried to pry herself through a window), a neighbor who wouldn't quit ringing her door bell until she was assured Julie wasn't dying (Julie assured her "no, Alma, I'm not dying nor do I plan on doing so anytime soon") and culminated in an argument with another neighbor over the height of the grass on her front lawn.

All that, as of mid-afternoon. It was no wonder that Julie, too tired to continue, collapsed on her couch and fell asleep.

 _WOOF WOOF WOOF_

 _WOOF WOOF WOOF_

 _WOOF WOOF WOOF_

Julie's "kids" – a Jack Russell terrier named Toni; Abby, a black cat; Jethro, the big German shepherd; Claude, the basset hound; and a golden retriever she named after herself – kept her company.

The basset hound was _his_ – Marcus's. The others were hers, although they all belonged to her, Marcus and the rest of the team.

They had been fed and watered, she was pretty sure, before she fell onto the couch; she'd get up and take care of them, again, after she got up. Given how the athletic, blonde, 41-year-old-going-on-29 felt, at the moment, like total crap, they'd probably be eating dinner around sunset.

 _WOOF WOOF WOOF_

 _WOOF WOOF WOOF_

 _WOOF WOOF WOOF_

Only the Second Coming, or the incessant barking of her "kids", could wake Julie from her slumber – that, and the ringtone on her NCIS-issued smartphone.

 _WOOF WOOF WOOF_

"I hear it, I hear ya," she muttered, as Julie the golden retriever began licking her face. Julie the dog had woken up Julie the human that way several times; sometimes Julie the human wiped her face afterwards.

 _WOOF WOOF WOOF_

"C'mon. Stop it," she said, as she fully woke up, realizing all of her kids were next to her, and that her phone was ringing.

 _WOOF WOOF WOOF_

The phone would not stop ringing, she decided. Whoever was on the line could be anybody. Whether she was 'fake-nice', snarky, or in an ass-kicking mood depended on who was calling her without leaving a voicemail.

She hit the green button on the screen and put the phone on speaker. "This is _Very_ Special Agent Juliana Rose Todd," she said in a mock-happy voice.

"Julie. It's Marcus," said Marcus Stewart, who was the last man she wanted to talk to right now.

" _Damn_ it," she swore, under her breath. "Hey, Marcus. I, ah, can I call you back—"

"We caught a case," he said, and this time she swore for real, glad her mother wasn't there to hear her use the f-word. As always, he took Julie and her quirks in stride. "How soon can you be ready?"

"A case? We have the day _off_ ," Julie said, as Toni the terrier jumped in her lap before she could get up and stretch. "Rock Creek Park or Norfolk or whatever, Balboa can handle. He came back for stuff like that—"

"Julie, it's not that kind of case," Stewart replied, filling her in on what Katie Yates had told her. "Here's the thing…Katie tells me the people are different."

A chill shot up Julie's spine. "'Different'."

"This isn't the team that could have been that we met in 2014. This is the team that could have been from…if Haswari hadn't done what he done."

Julie figured out the implication moments later. "Marcus. Is _she_ —"

"Katie says she is. Katie talked to Abby. Katie saw them all. Including David. She saw Mike Franks. Katie saw her—"

"Kate."

"Yeah."

"My twin sister is dead, Marcus. They're all dead. _All_ _dead_."

"These are..alternates, doppelgangers," Marcus said. "Just like three years ago. There are thousands of people at that stadium. We need to get there, and find our people—"

"They died 12 _years_ ago, Marcus," Julie said, with an eerie calmness. "The ones from that other world, weren't them. Neither were those zombies that Black Hand creep threw at us—"

"You're right; they're not the people we lost. But they're like them, and I want you and Brooke and everyone else at RFK to find them before the DEO or Luthor or someone in this damn city gets the same idea."

"Marcus…you say Katie told you Kate was there."

"Yeah," he said a moment later. "If you leave now, Brooke and the others should get there about the same time. I'll call Brooke, then the—"

"How are _you_ gonna get there?"

"I'll ask the director to send me a Marine copter, after I talk to Brooke—"

" _I'll_ call Brooke. _You_ call the director. He doesn't like it when we talk to each other before we talk to him."

"'Better to seek forgiveness than ask permission'. Just tell her to get there."

"After I explain to her what's going on?"

"I'm watching live video on the ZNN app on my phone, Julie. She _already_ knows."

 _-California Governor Jerry Brown has declared a State of Emergency, following the lead of the governors of four other states: Georgia, Kentucky, Puerto Rico and Texas. During his brief address broadcast this afternoon, Brown said FEMA and state authorities estimate over 3 and a half million people appeared through the wormholes—_

 _-the Dow has not closed, but is down 62 points since news of the wormholes first broke hours ago—_

 _-GBS News has confirmed the Justice League branch operating out of Detroit is assisting local police and FEMA in setting up an estimated 60,000 refugees at Ford Field and another 15,000 at Little Ceasar's Arena. Comerica Park, which was set to host a baseball game between the Detroit Tigers and the Coast City Pilots, is now accommodating another 10,000 refugees—_

 _-taking Superman's suggestions and opening up convention space in downtown Atlanta, along with Philips Arena and the soon-to-be demolished Georgia Dome—_

 _-some surprising news here in London: two men claiming to be the late John Lennon and Freddie Mercury have met with Sir Elton John and Sir Paul McCartney—_

 _-the liberal news media won't give my guest the time of day, but I will! He's asking a very good question: are these 'refugees' aliens in disguise? Perhaps, Appellaxians? HMMMM….-_

 _-the White House has no comment yet on the developing story other than 'President Luthor is monitoring the situation and will address the nation at 6 p.m. Eastern'-_

 **3:24 p.m.**

 **Washington, D.C.**

 **The Navy Yard**

 **NCIS Headquarters**

After stepping back, Commander Will Coburn took in the six-foot high base of the copper statue, and the life-sized figures atop its base.

Coburn stood just two inches above the base, and despite his large, solid frame and the intense personality that helped him both as the former commanding officer of the USS John F. Kennedy, then as the Special Agent in Charge of the NCIS field office operating out of Camp Lejeune near Wilmington, North Carolina, felt small.

Just over 12 years ago, an entire NCIS team – the Major Case Response Team based here in Washington at the time – were murdered over the course of four days by a rogue triple agent. The statue commemorated their lives and their sacrifice, and represented so much more.

Ari Haswari, whom the FBI and the Israeli security agency Mossad both thought was working for them spying on Islamist terror organizations, was actually working for the head of the infamous Task Force X. Coburn knew what came afterwards – two months of pure hell that made the events of 9/11 look like child's play. The Siege ended with over two million dead, including a sitting President of the United States, and the psyches of the survivors scarred to varying degrees.

Coburn was still on active duty serving aboard the John F. Kennedy when The Siege went down. The Kennedy came across a civilian ship that wouldn't respond to hails; Coburn saw the butchered bodies of the civilians on board, and the hand of Haswari and Task Force X in causing their deaths. Even after relying on his own Christian faith, Coburn still lived with the occasional nightmare from that day.

 _Never Forget_ , said a part of the inscription on base. _No one will forget The Siege,_ thought Coburn. _I hope no one forgets them._

The people leading the current incarnation of the Washington MCRT certainly wouldn't.

Coburn showed his ID at the entrance into the NCIS building and glanced at the video monitors on the walls; CNN showed host Wolf Blitzer, msnbc a table full of hosts, Fox News the Senator Mitch McConnell, LexNews someone from the floor of the New York Stock Exchange. _More talking heads_ , he thought. _Probably the same old, same old._

He briefly pondered checking his Compaq Phone for messages, but since he had set it to receive only work-related texts and calls – and it had been blissfully silent for the past four hours – Coburn left it in his pants pocket. He stepped into the elevator – alone - that would take him to the third floor, and to the MCRT's bullpen.

 _Looks like it'll be a nice, quiet day_ , he thought, as the elevator made its way upward. _Haven't had many of those in awhile._

The doors opened onto a third floor in a state of frantic activity; three people brushed past him without excusing themselves, all talking on their mobile devices. He stepped out as four more people hurried past him into the elevator, and he took in the scene: anyone on the floor was either talking on a phone, or into a monitor, or looking at one of the video monitors.

Coburn turned to the large monitor to his left, the one above the portraits of the criminals making up the NCIS Most Wanted List – among them Ari Haswari, Ra's al Ghul, the second Joker, Paloma Reynosa, and Marcel Janvier – and thought it odd NCIS was showing a science-fiction video show. It showed what looked like an ABC News special report, and a wormhole appearing in the middle of the Navy Pier in Chicago.

"Commander!" he heard; Coburn turned to his right to see one of his team members: Chief Petty Officer Remy Gautreau, who had come to Washington with Coburn to shadow the MCRT members working today.

"Why is that monitor not on the news?", Coburn asked.

Gautreau – a tall, lean and muscular African-American and a former Navy SEAL - looked at the big monitor. "Boss, that _is_ the news."

"What?"

Gautreau filled him in. "This is happening all over the world."

"Not just the country?"

"No. It started happening about four hours ago. Things blew up within the last half-hour."

"Why wasn't I texted about this?"

"It hit a whole lot of people by surprise. And a lot of people weren't told what was going on. We think the big man was one of them."

Coburn turned around and looked towards the stairs, and the Multiple Threat Assessment Centre at the top of them, and towards the office of Director Maurice Drake he knew was in the hallway past the MCRT. "He usually is on top of things."

"He may be on top of this too, or he may be trying to catch up. He's walked in and out of that MCRT upstairs three times in the past hour."

"Walk with me," Coburn said, heading towards the MCRT bullpen. "You hear from Agent Stewart or Agent Todd?"

"Brooke – Agent Conners," Gautreau said, catching himself; he knew Coburn preferred referring to other agents formally as 'Agent' and by their last names, not informally by their first names. "She's talked with Stewart. She and Agent Dorneget are up in MTAC now. Agent Long left, and said he'd be right back."

"Let's wait for him, then," Coburn said, as they arrived at the bullpen. The main monitor showed ZNN; two smaller monitors showed CBS and CNC. All were focused on the ongoing event. "What about the rest of our team?"

"On their way here. Shel will have to put his dog in the facility's kennel. Maggie's bringing her mother and Estrella her kids to the visitor's lounge first. I told Nina to drop her husband and kids off there, too."

"Good. The director ask about me yet?"

"No. He knows we're here, though," Gautreau replied.

"Then, while we wait – we text our people."

Two minutes later, while Coburn was texting his entire team, Special Agent Carlton Long – a 6-foot-5 African American who looked like he could play linebacker for the Redskins or dominate the UFC's heavyweight division in addition to taking down a dozen hostiles without breaking a sweat – walked off the rear elevator. "Commander Coburn," he said. 

"Agent Long," he said. "Any word on NCIS's response to…whatever is going on here?"

"Director Drake's upstairs coordinating things with some of the assistant directors: Larkin, Mosley, Ochoa, I think."

"Assistant Director Larkin upstairs?"

"He's at Quantico; we've got an office there. Brooke and Ned's upstairs talking to Mosley; she's out of L.A.—"

"Running the West Coast Office of Special Projects. We're more familiar with Assistant Director Ochoa."

"He oversees the OSP's Miami office?" asked Long.

"Worked a case with them," Gautreau said. "Pretty insane – not as insane as whatever's going on now. This is Justice League territory, _homme_."

"I hear ya, bro, but this thing's turned into _everybody's_ territory—"

" _Agent_ Long," Corbin interjected, "when the rest of my team arrives, they're to gather here. You hear from your C.O.?"

Long knew Coburn referred to Stewart and Todd. "Marc—sorry, Agent Stewart's reaching out to Agent Todd. Brooke—sorry, Agent Conners—told me to hang tight until we hear from him and Agent Todd."

"I'm going upstairs," Coburn said. "When the rest of our team gets to the Navy Yard, Petty Officer Gautreau, tell them to report here to the bullpen. I'll speak with Agent Conners, then contact Agents Stewart and Todd."

Coburn sprinted up the stairs. "He always that formal, Remy?" Long asked.

"Not always. Just when there's a case."

"This is one hell of a case."

Coburn walked straight to the entrance to MTAC, looked at the iris scanner that he expected would buzz him inside and…nothing. Thirty seconds later, he headed towards Drake's office.

 **3:34 p.m.**

 **Manassas, Virginia**

 **Intersection of Prince William Parkway and Balls Ford Road**

Stewart pulled his jeep over to the side of the road, watching the NCIS-requisitioned Hughes OH-6 Cayuse light observation helicopter land in the intersection, with four Manassas Police vehicle blocking traffic in all directions. He saw a Marine run right towards him, grabbed his go bag and ran out, meeting the Marine halfway.

"Lieutenant Juan Montano Jr., sir, here to take your keys and drive your vehicle back to the Navy Yard," the Marine said as Stewart handed him the key fob. The OH-6 had not powered down.

"That thing behind you looks like it came out of a M*A*S*H episode," Stewart said.

"That may be, sir, but she's good and sturdy and gets the job done," the lieutenant said.

"Don't wreck my jeep, and enjoy the weather; it's a nice day out," Stewart said, running to the OH-6. "The way traffic looked going into D.C., we may actually beat you there."

He got inside the vintage helicopter, and shook the hand of the pilot, Lieutenant Erin Turner. "Thanks for the ride, Lieutenant, though I've got to admit I expected something a little newer."

"Don't let appearances fool you, sir. 'Jessie' will get you where you need to go safe and sound – and fast. We'll land near the FEMA camp near the north end of the stadium, Agent Stewart," she said as the copter lifted off the pavement and headed east. "ETA" – estimated time of arrival – "is 30 to 35 minutes."

"We _are_ a long way from Washington," he said. "But a half-hour?"

"Jessie may be… _seasoned_ , sir, but she can go, up to 175 miles an hour. We won't go quite that fast, but just about."

"Do I want to ask?"

"Let me put it this way…if she was a stock car, Jessie'd wake them boys and girls up and give them a _race_."

 **3:39 p.m.**

 **RFK Stadium**

While his team talked amongst themselves on what their next move should be, Gibbs looked at the stands, in particular the press box. There was something….different about it, from when and DiNozzo went to the RFK Stadium they knew to see the Redskins play.

He thought he remembered the press box hanging over the lower deck. The press box he was staring at didn't have club seats directly underneath it, like the ones the Redskins built in…

 _My world._

He noticed five different types of people in the club seats and press facilities, but he only was interested in the one person who had been watching his people and himself since they had arrived.

"Boss? Boss? Where are you going?", DiNozzo called out as Gibbs walked away. DiNozzo, Kate Todd, Mike Franks and Jimmy Palmer began to run after him when Gibbs stopped, turned around 180 degrees and held his hand out.

"You stay here, no matter what," Gibbs said.

Kate sighed in frustration as the dogged ex-Marine made his way through the crowd, away from she and their team. "Why does he always do that?", she said to no one in particular.

"Maybe I taught him a little _too_ well," Franks said to her. "What in hell is he up to?"

"I think we ought to find out," she replied.

"We stay here, keep everyone together, just like Jethro said," Franks replied. "That doesn't mean we can't watch."

"Watch him," she said. "What's he up to?"

Katie Yates made her way into the stands, trying to stay incognito, trying to adhere to that rule that Marcus and Julie had about not letting 'them' see you while you're watching them. She felt strongly she was doing badly, but couldn't come up with a solid reason as to _why_.

She looked around for an empty seat to sit in, but every seat in the stadium was taken and more than a few people were sitting on the steps between sections. From what she had heard, hundreds of people had been put up in the concourse.

Some of these people looked familiar. They weren't anyone she knew or worked with personally; they were people she had seen at the coffee shop, a restaurant, or the bookstore. She suddenly realized she hadn't thought about the people in the stands; who they were, where they were from, how confused many of them were, how upset some others were.

 _What had happened wherever it was that they came from?,_ she thought _. What was it like to go through that wormhole that the FEMA people had specifically instructed 'volunteers' like her NOT to discuss with anyone?_

Like most people who worked for the government, Katie had heard whispers of cases of interactions between the Justice League and military personnel with people from parallel universes. _Could those people who looked like Gibbs and Julie's sister and the others – could all of these people – be from one of those universes?_

 _Omigod. That_ has _to be what's going on._

For the moment, Katie put the issue of the Gibbs team lookalikes – and the origins of these 'refugees' - aside. She looked around the crowd, this time for who else was here. She reckoned that there were about 3,000 FEMA people here – and not all of them looked the part.

 _So who was Agency? Bureau? Homeland? DEO? There's nobody from NCIS, just me._

She looked around again, and decided Marcus and the rest of her team couldn't get there soon enough. She'd stay where she was, sitting in the aisles, and decided to resume looking for the Gibbs lookalikes.

"Haven't seen this many people here since my buddy and I saw the 'Skins play the Meteors," she heard a man say, sitting in the aisle seat right next to her. "Came back the next year, when they played the Cowboys."

Katie realized she had a golden opportunity fall in her lap: _talk to somebody, figure out who they are, where they're from, anything else that the FEMA people didn't mention in that meeting yesterday. Like Dwayne Pride said, 'learn things'._

"I'm not much of a sports person myself," she said, looking out at the crowd. "I've been to a few concerts – me and my girlfriend saw Shania Twain here last August."

Then she realized how rude she was, staring at the crowd and not talking to the man next to her. She turned to her left to introduced herself, and gasped a moment later. "Oh God."

"Nope, just an NCIS agent," he said with a smile, attempting to put her at ease while reaching for his ID badge in his back pocket. He showed it, and she stared at the name next to the photo:

Leroy Jethro Gibbs.


	4. Chapter 4

**Chapter 4**

 _It is a man's own mind, not his enemy or foe, that lures him to evil ways._

-Buddha

 **8:46 p.m. Greenwich Mean Time**

 **3:46 p.m. Eastern Daylight Time**

 **London, U.K.**

 **Hilton Heathrow Airport Hotel**

Ari Haswari was in a hurry.

If the Indian hacker-for-hire he chose to set up his transporter travel route did her job, Haswari would go from the Arabian peninsula to the United Kingdom in less than 10 minutes, undetected. No time could be wasted; Haswari had to be in America as soon as possible, without drawing the attention of the numerous international intelligence agencies who had him at the top of their most wanted lists. The transporter would facilitate the first part of his journey to the States.

One of the greatest advances in travel in the past three decades was the development of the transporter and, like a number of technological advances, its origin was extraterrestrial – specifically, Rann.

Because it worked exactly like the transporter in the Star Trek universe, though, the popular perception of the Rannians inventing the technology after watching an episode of Star Trek with the show's creator, Gene Roddenberry, still lingered (one of the first things the Rannian Ambassador did after arriving on Earth was, in fact, to watch an episode of Trek with Roddenberry and President Ronald Reagan). In reality, the technology had been invented while Earth fought its first World War, and the Rannians helped develop the five transport networks in use – civilian, government, military, intelligence and private.

The civilian networks were the least used, high prices limiting the technology to multi-millionaire celebrities and entrepreneurs – such as Richard Branson, Jay-Z, the Kardashians, Lionel Messi and Bruce Wayne. Companies used the technology to transport rare items. The lack of 'bandwidth' kept it out of mass use for the time being.

Government, military and intelligence networks had priority, and used when necessary, or expedient. Some users still shared the viewpoint of Star Trek character Leonard McCoy towards the transporter of not wanting their "atoms scattered halfway across the universe", and preferred the slower, and perceivably safer, means of aircraft to travel where they needed to go.

The private network became the domain of major corporate executives and the ultra-rich and powerful: Fortune 500 companies, Russian oligarchs, Chinese executives and Western businessmen had their own branches off the main network. President Luthor still had his own branch; so did the Justice League groups, the Global Guardians, and the Chinese, Russian and 'nonaligned' heroic groups.

Today, Haswari used the Interpol network to transport himself and his baggage, in quick succession, from Ra's Al-Ghul's compound to Dubai; to Ankara, Turkey; to Munich, Germany; and to Heathrow. Under the alias of German football official Thomas Mueller – looking more German than either his Israeli father or his Arab mother – Haswari appeared on a one-person pad behind a supply closet near the entrance to a stairway. He pushed a series of buttons he knew Interpol agents used to fool security cameras into not seeing them leave the closet and enter the hallway, while monitoring hidden camera footage that showed the entrance to the closet and the stairwell, and the nearby hallway.

Two minutes later, he saw an opening, and confidently walked into the hall, headed towards the front desk. Once he found the walkway to Heathrow's Terminal 4, Haswari would take the six-minute walk to T4, then take the TfL Rail to Terminal 5. That's where he'd take the 9:55 TWA flight to Baltimore-Washington Airport; by the time Interpol realized someone had used their transport network, Haswari would be in America.

Haswari hadn't covered his tracks enough. Someone at Interpol headquarters in Brussels discovered the intrusion, and had already traced its origin to the Al-Ghul compound.

At 8:51 p.m. GMT, calls were made to MI5 – the U.K. domestic intelligence service – the American Central Intelligence Agency, and the Israeli security service Mossad. One minute later, another call was made: to Talia Head, the acting Chief Executive Officer of LexCorp.

Talia Head – a.k.a. Talia Al-Ghul, the daughter of the Demon's Head, Ra's Al-Ghul, the ecological terrorist who had sheltered Haswari since The Siege – was very interested in Ari Haswari's whereabouts. Head took a call from her Interpol source at LexCorp's Metropolis headquarters, wired 100,000 Francs to the source's secret Swiss bank account, then made travel arrangements.

If Haswari was going to Washington, so was she.

 **3:52 p.m. EDT**

 **Washington, D.C.**

 **The White House**

President Luthor never made use of the couches in the Oval Office whenever speaking with anyone. He sat behind his desk as a symbol of the power he held; the furniture was arranged to face the desk and its sole user. If a head of state or ambassador visited, he or she sat in an easy chair situated to the President's right, three feet from his desk; Congressional leaders, intelligence directors, military officers sat in the couches arranged eight feet from the desk's front.

It showed the relative respect Luthor had for his Vice President that Frank Rock sat in the chair to the President's right. Rock drank a cup of black coffee, while Luthor had a bottle of water. Rock still had no idea what the President ate at all, or drank other than water, whereas Luthor seemed to know Rock's culinary and beverage preferences intimately – just like he knew so much about the former general's life.

"Just spoke with Homeland," Luthor said. "President Boehner's asking questions at Andrews. Wants to talk to me. "

"I can't blame him, Mr. President," Rock said. His respect for the office of the President of the United States was immense; he still wasn't fully certain about the man currently holding that position, but tried not to let it show. "He _is_ the President, or a President. He's used to getting his way."

"That _has_ crossed my mind, Frank. I don't want to go there uninformed. Look at page one." Luthor picked up a folder and gestured to the one in Rock's hand. "Skim through it real quick."

Rock skimmed the first page inside the folder as ordered. "Updated target list on Earth-17 isn't as complete as I would expect, sir. I'm surprised there's anyone over there to send us intel, to be honest. I expected their World War III to be total, no survivors in their CONUS."

"Their defense shield held better than expected, Frank. It's not on that page, but we're getting intel from some surprising places."

"Such as?"

"Laurel Canyon in Los Angeles. Pontiac, Michigan. Cleveland, Ohio. New Orleans. And from more expected places like Roseboro, Oregon; Mount Vernon, Illinois; and Charlottesville, Virginia. This tells us not all the missiles got through. Their defense shield held. I wonder how much was saved?"

"I assume you'll talk to him about those FEMA camps being set up across the country?", asked Rock. The VP referred to the temporary FEMA camps being set up for the so-far estimated seven million refugees from Earth-17

"I'm sure he'll have questions about them."

"Mr. President, you may want to reconsider the suggestion from the President of Earth-23—"

"I'd prefer not to use federal resources on that project and strongly believe the private sector will deliver better results," Luthor said. Rock knew Luthor was referring to his LexCorp company, which was in fact in the final stages of taking over the camps from FEMA. Rock saw the plans four days ago, and was somewhat impressed with LexCorp's plans to turn the camps into their own separate towns, or extentions of nearby cities and towns.

Of course, Luthor stood to benefit from LexCorp's exclusive contract financially and in other ways. The President would likely face close scrutiny from both Congress and the media in the days to come, and Rock wondered if the public that supported Luthor would ask its own questions or go along with whatever Luthor said. "Before I gave up day-to-day leadership to my CEO, I was involved in the planning. It was a hell of a thing, Frank."

"Setting up a livable community in months from nothing, you mean."

"Hiding it from the alien and his costumed friends," Luthor replied, with a hint of disgust, referring to his 'former' arch-enemy Superman, and the rest of the Justice League. "But yes, setting up communities as well. They're cutting edge models and my peop—the LexCorp people have learned much about setting them up more quickly and thoroughly than this first generation. Imagine, if Yellowstone exploded – or one of Superman's enemies destroyed half the country - we can comfortably resettle the people in the other half in days!"

"That's a bold vision, Mr. President."

"And I have no doubt I'll be able to allay Mr. Boehner's concerns about his people," Luthor said, looking at his LexTech smart watch. "Marine One should be here in five minutes. I want you in the Situation Room while I'm gone."

Luthor got up, as two members of his Secret Service detail entered the Oval Office. They would escort Luthor to the Presidential VH-60N White Hawk helicopter designated Marine One that would take him the short trip to Andrews Air Force Base nearby in Maryland. Rock would go into the White House Situation Room below ground, monitoring news and intelligence on Luthor's behalf.

"Good luck, Mr. President," Rock said, as Luthor nodded his assent while leaving the Oval Office, walking the short distance to the South Lawn to await Marine One.

 **3:53 p.m. EDT**

 **Silver Spring, Maryland**

Julie Todd's mind was focused on about a dozen different things, so much that it didn't have room to blindside her with the one thing that would take up all her attention.

"Computa. Keep the boys and girls out of trouble," she said aloud in her living room, going through her gear bag to make sure nothing was missing from it. Her 'kids' – the dogs and cat – watched her nearby from the kitchen.

" _Your wish is my command, Juliana,"_ replied the computer voice, which sounded a lot like the Siri artificial intelligence used on the Apple computers and communicators. Computa herself was an advanced AI using technology recently developed by the WayneTech corporation; Julie was granted it a year ago as a favor from the corporation's owner and CEO, Bruce Wayne, to Marcus Stewart. Wayne himself had it developed from 30th century technology he 'came across' as the Batman on a Justice League case in – where else? – the late 30th century.

So far, neither the rightful owners of the technology, nor the Legion of Super-Heroes from that era, had come back in time to recover the tech. And, no one other than Julie, Marcus, Bruce Wayne/Batman nor Superman knew about Computa's presence in Julie's home.

She wondered how much longer that would last. It was working out better than having neighbors watch the pets; at least Computa was fully vetted.

" _Should I appear in Nice Old Lady Mode?"_ , Computa asked, her too-pleasant voice filling the house.

"That's fine," Julie said, and a hologram of a 5-foot-8, slim Asian-American woman appeared in the living room. Computa would then speak through the hologram. "Usual protocol. Don't answer the door, if the bad guys break in call the Navy Yard and alert me. I should be back tonight."

" _I'll feed and water the pets,"_ Computa said. " _I'll even sing to them._ "

"You don't have to do that," Julie said, looking at the clock on her phone counting down from five minutes to zero. Her ride was less than two minutes out.

" _I have a lovely singing voice, I've been told, far lovelier than your own."_

"Who on Earth told you _that_?"

" _Katie Yates. She told me my singing voice was lovely and that you, quote, 'can't sing worth a lick'—"_

"She doesn't know what she's talking about," Julie interjected, rolling her eyes. "Gotta go. Make sure you feed and water the kids."

" _Always, Juliana. Are you at liberty to discuss what you have been called to?"_ Computa asked, and Julie saw the image of her dead sister flash in her mind.

"Later, Computa. Gotta go." Julie went out the front door of her house, taking one last look at her – and Marcus's – pets, all of whom were watching from the kitchen.

A minute later, she saw an NCIS Bell Twin Huey helicopter land in the middle of the street. She yelled thanks to the Silver Springs police officers who had blocked both ends of the street so the helicopter could land. They'd be at RFK in less than 15 minutes.

 **3:56 p.m.**

 **Washington**

 **Navy Yard, Multiple Threat Assessment Centre**

Drake looked at the large theater-sized screen in the large MTAC room, large enough to serve as a small movie theater in its own right; in fact, there were several rows of theater-esque seats in the back of the room. Along the sides were several computer terminal stations manned by technicians, and a dozen 55-inch 8K video screens above the terminals. The front wall was the large 30-foot-long 8K screen currently dominated by a map of Washington, with four small screens superimposed in each corner of the main screen.

The map showed RFK Stadium as a large red dot, and the current locations of the agents Drake was sending to the stadium as yellow dots: the helicopters ferrying Marcus Stewart and Julie Todd, along with the vehicles the rest of Stewart's and Commander Will Coburn's teams were taking, were all shown on the map as moving yellow dots.

In each corner, clockwise from the upper left, were NCIS Assistant Deputy Director Michael Larkin from the NCIS office in Quantico, Virginia; Louis Ochoa, the Assistant Director for Atlantic Operations from the Office of Special Projects in Miami, Florida; Shay Mosley, the Assistant Director for Pacific Operations, who had just taken over for the late Owen Granger, from her new office in Los Angeles; and the Department of Extranormal Operations' director known only as Mr. Bones, who looked like a skeleton dressed in a suit. Drake trusted his people without a doubt; Bones, on the other hand, he didn't trust quite as much.

"This line is as secure as it gets, folks," Drake said. "Our intel confirms _they_ are at the stadium. My previous decision stands, regardless of what SecDef or SecNav say. Opinions?"

"You're taking a _big_ risk, sir," Mosley said. "Crawford will not be happy and I would be remiss in my duties if I didn't speak for the record and state that the director of a federal agency going against his superiors is highly…irregular, to say the least."

"I'm not going against orders, Ms. Mosley," Drake said, in a faux-innocent tone. "I'm just helping secure my people—"

" _Are_ they your people, Director?" Mosley asked. "They're another director's people—"

"Call it intra-agency cooperation, then," Drake replied. "I'm sure Mr. McCallister – wherever he is – would appreciate the gesture and would do the same for us. Just like we did for Director Vance from Earth-Prime and Director McGee from Earth-2. Wouldn't you agree?"

"I might take a different approach, sir," she said. "That is why you hired me to oversee Office of Special Projects West and run Pacific Operations. To bring a certain team in line."

"Thanks for the reminder, Ms. Mosley, to discuss your duties in Los Angeles and what _I_ expect from you while you're there," he said. "Mr. Ochoa?"

"Without specific orders to stay out, sir, I'd have to agree with your tactics," Ochoa said. "I only wish I could bring my team in to assist."

"They have their hands full getting Agents Torres and Tuturro out of Corto Maltese. Walker from the Agency will help. I've got that REACT team you asked for heading that way from Puerto Rico."

"I appreciate it," Ochoa said. His Office of Special Projects team was in the small island nation to eliminate a drug ring that used US Navy ships in the Caribbean to run Thanagarian stimulants into the United States. Two of the team's members – Special Agent in Charge Nick Torres and Special Agent Johnny Tuturro – were captured by the military officers running the ring. The rest of the team, led by Senior Field Agent Paul Briggs, were trying to get their teammates out alive. "Any chance of getting Charlie back?"

"No chance," Drake said of 'Charlie', a.k.a. NCIS Special Agent Tammy Gregorio, assigned to the New Orleans field office. "They're busy on an op."

"Worth asking," Ochoa said. "With your permission, I'll log off now and contact you the moment there's movement in Corto Maltese."

"Hopefully that won't be too much longer," Drake said as Ochoa's inset screen disappeared from the main screen. "Mr. Larkin, you have a REACT team ready for me if it comes to it?"

"If it comes to it, Director, though I'm confident Commander Coburn and Agent Stewart can handle whatever they face there – if it's just FEMA security there," replied Larkin, a former New York City assistant police chief who was Assistant Director in charge of NCIS's REACT – Regional Enforcement Action and Capabilities Training – special forces teams. "If security is what I think it is, Director, I honestly don't think a REACT team would be enough."

"Speak up," Drake replied. He used that term whenever he wanted someone to get to the point.

"If POTUS is overseeing these…camps, and wanted to keep anyone who came through in those camps, he has to have some form of heightened security in place. Security against supervillains, criminal gangs-"

"Wayward federal agencies?" Drake replied.

"I didn't say _that_ , sir," Larkin replied, with a curt smile. "I'm thinking more to keep a stadium of people in – and that's going to take some heavy-duty, military-grade security. If that's the case – and you have to assume POTUS has something in place – you might need to call in more firepower."

"You're not talking about the Marines, either, are you Michael?", Mosley asked.

"I'm thinking of a certain man with a red cape who is, ah, more likely to believe Director Drake over the Commander in Chief," Larkin said.

"I know and assume the risks," Drake said. "Remember, no one – Luthor, Crawford, Sarah Porter – has told us not to undertake this operation."

"And what if they do?" Mosley said.

"We'll cross that bridge when we get to it," Drake said. "I want to review the non-NCIS part of our joint operation while Mr. Bones is here with us. Bones, any word from your people in RFK over the last 30 minutes?"

"I think Mr. Larkin is onto something, Maurice. They're probably dressed in FEMA garb—"

 **3:57 p.m. EDT**

 **Washington**

 **11** **th** **Street SE**

Carl Long drove his Corvette north just a tad above the speed limit, with Remy Gautreau riding shotgun. At a red light, Long tapped the screen on the car's audio player. "Siri, play Playlist #7."

" _Playing Playlist #7,"_ the female AI voice replied, and in moments the sounds of John Coltrane's _Alabama_ piece filled the car.

"What in heck _is_ that, _homme_?", Gautreau asked.

"Don't tell me you've never heard of Coltrane," Long said.

"I've heard of Coltrane. I grew up in New Orleans, remember? But _Coltrane_ on the way to a case? Homme, _Dwayne Pride's_ from there like I am, and _he_ doesn't do that." Gautreau had recently transferred back to the NCIS field office at Camp Lejeune in North Carolina from the New Orleans office led by Pride.

"Coltrane calms me down, helps me focus. It's something I started doing after I finished Agent Afloat duty and started working in Silverdale." Long's NCIS career trajectory took him from Singapore to the USS Independence to Silverdale, Washington, and eventually to Washington. "You play music on the way to a case or a crime scene?"

"Not _that_."

"What about Coburn? He have you playing Kirk Franklin?"

Gautreau chuckled. "Commander's not _that_ hands on, homme. He usually doesn't have anything on if he's driving on the job. There _was_ that one time. Somebody called Philips, Craig and Dean. _Homme_ …"

"Not your scene?" Long said with a chuckle as he took a right onto Independence Avenue SE, a straight shot to RFK.

"No. If I had to play music, it'd be Jay-Z or Drake. Or one of those country songs Shel likes to play. Luke Bryan. At least it has a beat, gets you going."

"Wanna _hear_ Luke Bryan?" Long offered.

"Heck no," Gautreau replied with a laugh. "Save that for those special occasions with Shel and his dog, when we're about to take down a drug dealer or rogue Marine or a redneck terrorist."

"' _Heck'_? Doesn't quite sound like something you'd say, man."

"That's the Commander rubbing off on me. He doesn't like cursing. Goes against one of his rules. He doesn't proselytize you if you're on his team, but does hold you to certain stand—hey, isn't that Conners?"

The two men saw a black Firebird speeding past them down Independence with its lights blaring. "Should've known Leadfoot couldn't wait to get to the scene," Long said as the car darted through traffic.

 **4 p.m. EDT**

 **Independence Ave SE and 16** **th** **Street**

Agent Brooke Conners and Agent Carl Long had one thing in common: they both preferred playing music on the way to a case. Their musical choices were very different.

Conners liked her car windows down, the wind flowing through her short, blonde hair, and classic rock blaring from the speakers. Whoever was in the passenger seat – like Agent Ned Dorneget – had one choice: enjoy it. As fast as 'Leadfoot' liked to drive, they wouldn't have to endure it for long if the case was in D.C. (If the case was further out – Joint Base Norfolk; rural West Virginia; or Metropolis – one simply made the best of it).

Dorneget was 'enjoying' the sounds of Led Zeppelin, one of Conners' favorite bands and not one of his.

"You think we'll have to park far away?", Dorneget asked.

'Dorney' was assigned to the team six years ago, and quickly overcame his 'nerdy first impression' (as Julie put it) and proved himself as the team's cyber and computer specialist. He also had proven to be a good hand in the field, and found a kindred spirit in Katie Yates (who, like Dorneget, is gay), Conners (who took him in like a younger brother) and Long (his complete opposite in many ways, and a buddy regardless).

"Nope," she said. "We're NCIS."

Conners was a free spirit, assigned to the MCRT in June 2008 after two team members were murdered in Miami on a joint operation with the Miami-Dade Police Department's Crime Scene Investigations unit. Conners had since proven to be a solid field agent and loyal to her new team – so loyal she turned down two offers to lead teams of her own. She was also outspoken, and her opinions had gotten her in hot water more than once with those way above her pay grade – like Clayton Jarvis, the former Secretary of the Navy.

Her Firebird sped down Independence, past the old National Guard Armory. She saw the first roadblocks well before she hit the brakes to avoid hitting the National Guard vehicles in the road.

"You NCIS?" the National Guard officer asked after Conners rolled down her window. She and Dorneget showed the woman their badges. "Nobody told us not to let you in so…park in the Blue Lot."

Conners waited for Long's Corvette, which was tailed by a silver Ford Expedition SUV. She looked in her rearview mirror – ignoring the Guard officer's repeated requests to go into the complex – and saw Commander Coburn driving the SUV with two other members of his team.

"They're with me," Conners said, just before she put her foot on the pedal and sped away into the parking lot.

 **4:06 p.m. EDT**

 **RFK Stadium**

"Wanna level with you," Gibbs told Katie, as she waited in line in the concourse behind 27 women, all needing to use the women's rest room. "My people and I want to get outta here."

 _Good thing nobody else heard you say that_ , she thought. Katie lingered about 12 feet behind the last person in line, a middle-school-aged girl.

She took a moment to take in the fact she was talking with someone who wasn't, and yet was in his own way, the legendary Leroy Jethro Gibbs who died in the line 12 years ago. Katie would've tried to kick him in the balls or the knees and ran by now, had her gut not reassured her he was a good person, albeit insistent on getting his way as far as leaving the facility.

Gibbs, even now, lingered as a larger-than-life figure around NCIS. Books had been written about his life, documentaries made about him and dozens of stories had been compiled on him by reporters; much about his life had long since been made a matter of public record, but there were so many mysteries that opened up whenever a story was told. Some of those mysteries were caused by unsubstantiated rumors on social media — why let the truth get in the way of a great story? — and some of them were true, their truths hidden from the public.

Katie looked back, years ago, when the woman she thought was the love of her life turned out to be a plant by the matriarch of a Mexican drug cartel, designed to get her to verify a weapon owned by a dead NCIS legend was used to murder the matriarch's father. The violence involved in recovering her from the cartel's 'safe house' in Virginia didn't bother her; it was the answer to her question to Director Vance: "What will you do with that report?" She hadn't seen it since, and for all she knew Vance might have buried it among a pile of cold cases, or tossed it in a fireplace, or shredded it and flushed the mulch down the commode.

 _That_ , not the psychological trauma caused by her lover's betrayal nor the sight of seeing her teammates gun down the thugs holding her hostage, caused her to lose so much of the innocence that charmed Marcus and Julie, Gerald, Greg and Barbie and, later, Brooke and Dwayne, when she dared to step into the pig-tails of the departed Abby Sciuto. Sure, the smiley faces and silly sayings ('Love Is All Around') were still all over the lab, and she still blared her 'happy music' at full volume, but Katherine Dawn Yates' inner child had grown up.

When something came up to remind her of her 'bad day', she usually walked away from it. Well, here was a living, breathing reminder of that incident, and she sure couldn't walk away from this — he wouldn't let her. She saw his people on the field, and they all looked like they could be the people who were killed by Ari Haswari 12 years ago — except for Stan Burley, whom she knew was alive.

The line to the women's room hadn't moved. She and Gibbs both heard faint whimpers from inside; she wanted to go in and see if she could help, but she _really_ had to go pee. If she left now, she'd have enough time to flash her badge past the guards and get into the FEMA-controlled luxury suite section. Gibbs wouldn't follow her inside, but he wasn't going to go away, either, and if he'd wait patiently outside, she'd take care of one problem so she could take care of his.

"Come with me," she said to Gibbs, and they made their way up the stairs 50 feet away to one of the entrances to the suites. The guard started to say something to them, but Katie flashed her NCIS badge and said 'get out of my way, I gotta _pee_!"

"You'll have to wait here," Katie told Gibbs. "Give me ten minutes."

Inside the ladies' room, she took the nearest stall, and did her business. While washing her hands, she heard a voice from the other stall ask "what's he like?".

Katie's head whipped around and she reached for the palm-sized stunner hidden under her shirt. When the occupant opened the stall door, she had the weapon pointed right at him; her eyebrows shot up once she recognized him, and she bit her tongue to keep from yelling at the man.

"LARRY! _What_ in the _world_ are you _doing_!?"

A short, slender, thirty-something man of Indian descent stepped out, hands held up. His name was Kartik Viswanathan and he was a special agent with the Department of Extranormal Operations who had worked with the MCRT on several occasions. Katie — and the rest of her team — called the usually well-dressed, cocky, mischievous agent by his preferred nickname Larry, and he often socialized with them off-hours. Larry sometimes got on Katie's nerves, but they were good friends — although not good enough for her to overlook his being in the ladies' room.

"Sorry, babe," Larry said with a smile and a wink. "I'm on the job—"

"That's not part of your job!", she said, thrusting her forefinger at the stall he had stepped out from. "What on Earth are you doing in there?"

"Watching your back," he said, and she then noticed he was dressed in the same FEMA collared shirt and khakis she and the other 'volunteers' were dressed in. "There's some crazy shit going down—"

Katie stormed over to Larry, grabbed him by his collar and — over his protests — pushed him back into the stall, then locked the door behind her.

"Whoa _now_ , Kates," he said, using a portmanteau of her first and last names. "I _swear_ I'm on the job—"

"You better be, buddy," she shot back, although she figured by then he was telling the truth. "You couldn't talk to me _outside_? And watch your mouth."

"Sorry," he said, and she let go of his collar. "They've got eyes all over this place," he said.

"' _They'_?"

"Yup."

Katie rolled her eyes; she made sure he would never live this incident down in either of their lifetimes. "And who _are_ 'they'?"

"Uh…"

"Uh what?"

"Uh, as in, _we_ , as in the DEO, don't know who _they_ are. Yet."

Katie glared at him for several moments, then thought of Gibbs and the possibility the old man might be outside right then, or sending for someone like Kate Todd — or Ziva David — to make sure she didn't get lost. "So they, whoever 'they' are, are watching us—"

"You, the people. Gibbs. Look, Kates, we heard chatter about something like today going down, and some group trying to round up people without anyone hearing about it. The media, the feds like us, the military, the Justice League. That got blown all to hell today, so now we think they're working on their Plan B."

"Any idea what this 'Plan B' might be?"

"No, not yet, but Mr. B figured if we have anyone of interest cross over, get to them before 'they' do." Katie knew 'Mr. B' as the DEO Director, Mr. Bones, whom she once called a 'living, icky skeleton' due to the man's skeleton being the only visible thing about him besides the suits he wore (along with the cigarettes he always smoked). "Mr. B knows Gibbs are here, and said to assume other people do, too."

"You think 'they' are super villains? Russians? Chinese? Khunds? Terrorists?" Larry shrugged his shoulders. "Government?"

Larry didn't shrug his shoulders. "Maybe. The bugs I found are ones that used to be used by the CIA back in the day. Got one in an evidence bag in my pocket. We're gonna look at it when I get back."

"Why couldn't you wait outside," she sighed.

"One, if that guy is like the Gibbs I read about, he'd be worse to get through than Batman. Two, whoever 'they' are, they didn't have time to put bugs everywhere. They didn't bug the restrooms — we don't _think_ they did anyway. This is the safest place to talk to you."

"You think this was a rush job?", she asked. "That entire operation outside took months to organize—"

"Yeah, but the bugs are scattered, like someone had hours notice and put them wherever."

"Darn it…speaking of Gibbs, I'd say his 'Bug sense' is on override," she said. "I better get back out there."

"It's his gut, Katie. Same thing Julie talks about all the time. I'd thought you had known that—"

"I know what a gut is, Larry," she said. "Mine is telling me he's losing his mind by now. Just get behind me, I'll tell him you're with me, and we'll work on the plan he and I figured out."

"Which is?"

"Wait for Marcus and Julie."

"Just tell me where the explosion is so I can hide behind the furthest wall."

"Oh my gosh! It was the freakin' Clock King, Larry. Not somebody like Bane…come on."

Elsewhere in the stands, a man in FEMA clothing watched the crowd with a pair of binoculars; two minutes later, he saw Katie, Larry and Gibbs step back outside and make their way down towards the field.

He pulled out a smartphone and dialed a number; "Targets are on the move," he said.

"The window of opportunity is closing fast," said a woman on the other line. "Whatever you're going to do, get it done. The NCIS people are on the premises."

"Copy that," the man said.


	5. Chapter 4 (updated)

**Chapter 4**

 _It is a man's own mind, not his enemy or foe, that lures him to evil ways._

-Buddha

 **8:46 p.m. Greenwich Mean Time**

 **3:46 p.m. Eastern Daylight Time**

 **London, U.K.**

 **Hilton Heathrow Airport Hotel**

Ari Haswari was in a hurry.

If the Indian hacker-for-hire he chose to set up his transporter travel route did her job, Haswari would go from the Arabian peninsula to the United Kingdom in less than 10 minutes, undetected. No time could be wasted; Haswari had to be in America as soon as possible, without drawing the attention of the numerous international intelligence agencies who had him at the top of their most wanted lists. The transporter would facilitate the first part of his journey to the States.

One of the greatest advances in travel in the past three decades was the development of the transporter and, like a number of technological advances, its origin was extraterrestrial – specifically, Rann.

Because it worked exactly like the transporter in the Star Trek universe, though, the popular perception of the Rannians inventing the technology after watching an episode of Star Trek with the show's creator, Gene Roddenberry, still lingered (one of the first things the Rannian Ambassador did after arriving on Earth was, in fact, to watch an episode of Trek with Roddenberry and President Ronald Reagan). In reality, the technology had been invented while Earth fought its first World War, and the Rannians helped develop the five transport networks in use – civilian, government, military, intelligence and private.

The civilian networks were the least used, high prices limiting the technology to multi-millionaire celebrities and entrepreneurs – such as Richard Branson, Jay-Z, the Kardashians, Lionel Messi and Bruce Wayne. Companies used the technology to transport rare items. The lack of 'bandwidth' kept it out of mass use for the time being.

Government, military and intelligence networks had priority, and used when necessary, or expedient. Some users still shared the viewpoint of Star Trek character Leonard McCoy towards the transporter of not wanting their "atoms scattered halfway across the universe", and preferred the slower, and perceivably safer, means of aircraft to travel where they needed to go.

The private network became the domain of major corporate executives and the ultra-rich and powerful: Fortune 500 companies, Russian oligarchs, Chinese executives and Western businessmen had their own branches off the main network. President Luthor still had his own branch; so did the Justice League groups, the Global Guardians, and the Chinese, Russian and 'nonaligned' heroic groups.

Today, Haswari used the Interpol network to transport himself and his baggage, in quick succession, from Ra's Al-Ghul's compound to Dubai; to Ankara, Turkey; to Munich, Germany; and to Heathrow. Under the alias of German football official Thomas Mueller – looking more German than either his Israeli father or his Arab mother – Haswari appeared on a one-person pad behind a supply closet near the entrance to a stairway. He pushed a series of buttons he knew Interpol agents used to fool security cameras into not seeing them leave the closet and enter the hallway, while monitoring hidden camera footage that showed the entrance to the closet and the stairwell, and the nearby hallway.

Two minutes later, he saw an opening, and confidently walked into the hall, headed towards the front desk. Once he found the walkway to Heathrow's Terminal 4, Haswari would take the six-minute walk to T4, then take the TfL Rail to Terminal 5. That's where he'd take the 9:55 TWA flight to Baltimore-Washington Airport; by the time Interpol realized someone had used their transport network, Haswari would be in America.

Haswari hadn't covered his tracks enough. Someone at Interpol headquarters in Brussels discovered the intrusion, and had already traced its origin to the Al-Ghul compound.

At 8:51 p.m. GMT, calls were made to MI5 – the U.K. domestic intelligence service – the American Central Intelligence Agency, and the Israeli security service Mossad. One minute later, another call was made: to Talia Head, the acting Chief Executive Officer of LexCorp.

Talia Head – a.k.a. Talia Al-Ghul, the daughter of the Demon's Head, Ra's Al-Ghul, the ecological terrorist who had sheltered Haswari since The Siege – was very interested in Ari Haswari's whereabouts. Head took a call from her Interpol source at LexCorp's Metropolis headquarters, wired 100,000 Francs to the source's secret Swiss bank account, then made travel arrangements.

If Haswari was going to Washington, so was she.

 **3:52 p.m. EDT**

 **Washington, D.C.**

 **The White House**

President Luthor never made use of the couches in the Oval Office whenever speaking with anyone. He sat behind his desk as a symbol of the power he held; the furniture was arranged to face the desk and its sole user. If a head of state or ambassador visited, he or she sat in an easy chair situated to the President's right, three feet from his desk; Congressional leaders, intelligence directors, military officers sat in the couches arranged eight feet from the desk's front.

It showed the relative respect Luthor had for his Vice President that Frank Rock sat in the chair to the President's right. Rock drank a cup of black coffee, while Luthor had a bottle of water. Rock still had no idea what the President ate at all, or drank other than water, whereas Luthor seemed to know Rock's culinary and beverage preferences intimately – just like he knew so much about the former general's life.

"Just spoke with Homeland," Luthor said. "President Boehner's asking questions at Andrews. Wants to talk to me. "

"I can't blame him, Mr. President," Rock said. His respect for the office of the President of the United States was immense; he still wasn't fully certain about the man currently holding that position, but tried not to let it show. "He _is_ the President, or a President. He's used to getting his way."

"That _has_ crossed my mind, Frank. I don't want to go there uninformed. Look at page one." Luthor picked up a folder and gestured to the one in Rock's hand. "Skim through it real quick."

Rock skimmed the first page inside the folder as ordered. "Updated target list on Earth-17 isn't as complete as I would expect, sir. I'm surprised there's anyone over there to send us intel, to be honest. I expected their World War III to be total, no survivors in their CONUS."

"Their defense shield held better than expected, Frank. It's not on that page, but we're getting intel from some surprising places."

"Such as?"

"Laurel Canyon in Los Angeles. Pontiac, Michigan. Cleveland, Ohio. New Orleans. And from more expected places like Roseboro, Oregon; Mount Vernon, Illinois; and Charlottesville, Virginia. This tells us not all the missiles got through. Their defense shield held. I wonder how much was saved?"

"I assume you'll talk to him about those FEMA camps being set up across the country?", asked Rock. The VP referred to the temporary FEMA camps being set up for the so-far estimated seven million refugees from Earth-17

"I'm sure he'll have questions about them."

"Mr. President, you may want to reconsider the suggestion from the President of Earth-23—"

"I'd prefer not to use federal resources on that project and strongly believe the private sector will deliver better results," Luthor said. Rock knew Luthor was referring to his LexCorp company, which was in fact in the final stages of taking over the camps from FEMA. Rock saw the plans four days ago, and was somewhat impressed with LexCorp's plans to turn the camps into their own separate towns, or extentions of nearby cities and towns.

Of course, Luthor stood to benefit from LexCorp's exclusive contract financially and in other ways. The President would likely face close scrutiny from both Congress and the media in the days to come, and Rock wondered if the public that supported Luthor would ask its own questions or go along with whatever Luthor said. "Before I gave up day-to-day leadership to my CEO, I was involved in the planning. It was a hell of a thing, Frank."

"Setting up a livable community in months from nothing, you mean."

"Hiding it from the alien and his costumed friends," Luthor replied, with a hint of disgust, referring to his 'former' arch-enemy Superman, and the rest of the Justice League. "But yes, setting up communities as well. They're cutting edge models and my peop—the LexCorp people have learned much about setting them up more quickly and thoroughly than this first generation. Imagine, if Yellowstone exploded – or one of Superman's enemies destroyed half the country - we can comfortably resettle the people in the other half in days!"

"That's a bold vision, Mr. President."

"And I have no doubt I'll be able to allay Mr. Boehner's concerns about his people," Luthor said, looking at his LexTech smart watch. "Marine One should be here in five minutes. I want you in the Situation Room while I'm gone."

Luthor got up, as two members of his Secret Service detail entered the Oval Office. They would escort Luthor to the Presidential VH-60N White Hawk helicopter designated Marine One that would take him the short trip to Andrews Air Force Base nearby in Maryland. Rock would go into the White House Situation Room below ground, monitoring news and intelligence on Luthor's behalf.

"Good luck, Mr. President," Rock said, as Luthor nodded his assent while leaving the Oval Office, walking the short distance to the South Lawn to await Marine One.

 **3:53 p.m. EDT**

 **Silver Spring, Maryland**

Julie Todd's mind was focused on about a dozen different things, so much that it didn't have room to blindside her with the one thing that would take up all her attention.

"Computa. Keep the boys and girls out of trouble," she said aloud in her living room, going through her gear bag to make sure nothing was missing from it. Her 'kids' – the dogs and cat – watched her nearby from the kitchen.

" _Your wish is my command, Juliana,"_ replied the computer voice, which sounded a lot like the Siri artificial intelligence used on the Apple computers and communicators. Computa herself was an advanced AI using technology recently developed by the WayneTech corporation; Julie was granted it a year ago as a favor from the corporation's owner and CEO, Bruce Wayne, to Marcus Stewart. Wayne himself had it developed from 30th century technology he 'came across' as the Batman on a Justice League case in – where else? – the late 30th century.

So far, neither the rightful owners of the technology, nor the Legion of Super-Heroes from that era, had come back in time to recover the tech. And, no one other than Julie, Marcus, Bruce Wayne/Batman nor Superman knew about Computa's presence in Julie's home.

She wondered how much longer that would last. It was working out better than having neighbors watch the pets; at least Computa was fully vetted.

" _Should I appear in Nice Old Lady Mode?"_ , Computa asked, her too-pleasant voice filling the house.

"That's fine," Julie said, and a hologram of a 5-foot-8, slim Asian-American woman appeared in the living room. Computa would then speak through the hologram. "Usual protocol. Don't answer the door, if the bad guys break in call the Navy Yard and alert me. I should be back tonight."

" _I'll feed and water the pets,"_ Computa said. " _I'll even sing to them._ "

"You don't have to do that," Julie said, looking at the clock on her phone counting down from five minutes to zero. Her ride was less than two minutes out.

" _I have a lovely singing voice, I've been told, far lovelier than your own."_

"Who on Earth told you _that_?"

" _Katie Yates. She told me my singing voice was lovely and that you, quote, 'can't sing worth a lick'—"_

"She doesn't know what she's talking about," Julie interjected, rolling her eyes. "Gotta go. Make sure you feed and water the kids."

" _Always, Juliana. Are you at liberty to discuss what you have been called to?"_ Computa asked, and Julie saw the image of her dead sister flash in her mind.

"Later, Computa. Gotta go." Julie went out the front door of her house, taking one last look at her – and Marcus's – pets, all of whom were watching from the kitchen.

A minute later, she saw an NCIS Bell Twin Huey helicopter land in the middle of the street. She yelled thanks to the Silver Springs police officers who had blocked both ends of the street so the helicopter could land. They'd be at RFK in less than 15 minutes.

 **3:56 p.m.**

 **Washington**

 **Navy Yard, Multiple Threat Assessment Centre**

Drake looked at the large theater-sized screen in the large MTAC room, large enough to serve as a small movie theater in its own right; in fact, there were several rows of theater-esque seats in the back of the room. Along the sides were several computer terminal stations manned by technicians, and a dozen 55-inch 8K video screens above the terminals. The front wall was the large 30-foot-long 8K screen currently dominated by a map of Washington, with four small screens superimposed in each corner of the main screen.

The map showed RFK Stadium as a large red dot, and the current locations of the agents Drake was sending to the stadium as yellow dots: the helicopters ferrying Marcus Stewart and Julie Todd, along with the vehicles the rest of Stewart's and Commander Will Coburn's teams were taking, were all shown on the map as moving yellow dots.

In each corner, clockwise from the upper left, were NCIS Assistant Deputy Director Michael Larkin from the NCIS office in Quantico, Virginia; Louis Ochoa, the Assistant Director for Atlantic Operations from the Office of Special Projects in Miami, Florida; Shay Mosley, the Assistant Director for Pacific Operations, who had just taken over for the late Owen Granger, from her new office in Los Angeles; and the Department of Extranormal Operations' director known only as Mr. Bones, who looked like a skeleton dressed in a suit. Drake trusted his people without a doubt; Bones, on the other hand, he didn't trust quite as much.

"This line is as secure as it gets, folks," Drake said. "Our intel confirms _they_ are at the stadium. My previous decision stands, regardless of what SecDef or SecNav say. Opinions?"

"You're taking a _big_ risk, sir," Mosley said. "Crawford will not be happy and I would be remiss in my duties if I didn't speak for the record and state that the director of a federal agency going against his superiors is highly…irregular, to say the least."

"I'm not going against orders, Ms. Mosley," Drake said, in a faux-innocent tone. "I'm just helping secure my people—"

" _Are_ they your people, Director?" Mosley asked. "They're another director's people—"

"Call it intra-agency cooperation, then," Drake replied. "I'm sure Mr. McCallister – wherever he is – would appreciate the gesture and would do the same for us. Just like we did for Director Vance from Earth-Prime and Director McGee from Earth-2. Wouldn't you agree?"

"I might take a different approach, sir," she said. "That is why you hired me to oversee Office of Special Projects West and run Pacific Operations. To bring a certain team in line."

"Thanks for the reminder, Ms. Mosley, to discuss your duties in Los Angeles and what _I_ expect from you while you're there," he said. "Mr. Ochoa?"

"Without specific orders to stay out, sir, I'd have to agree with your tactics," Ochoa said. "I only wish I could bring my team in to assist."

"They have their hands full getting Agents Torres and Tuturro out of Corto Maltese. Walker from the Agency will help. I've got that REACT team you asked for heading that way from Puerto Rico."

"I appreciate it," Ochoa said. His Office of Special Projects team was in the small island nation to eliminate a drug ring that used US Navy ships in the Caribbean to run Thanagarian stimulants into the United States. Two of the team's members – Special Agent in Charge Nick Torres and Special Agent Johnny Tuturro – were captured by the military officers running the ring. The rest of the team, led by Senior Field Agent Paul Briggs, were trying to get their teammates out alive. "Any chance of getting Charlie back?"

"No chance," Drake said of 'Charlie', a.k.a. NCIS Special Agent Tammy Gregorio, assigned to the New Orleans field office. "They're busy on an op."

"Worth asking," Ochoa said. "With your permission, I'll log off now and contact you the moment there's movement in Corto Maltese."

"Hopefully that won't be too much longer," Drake said as Ochoa's inset screen disappeared from the main screen. "Mr. Larkin, you have a REACT team ready for me if it comes to it?"

"If it comes to it, Director, though I'm confident Commander Coburn and Agent Stewart can handle whatever they face there – if it's just FEMA security there," replied Larkin, a former New York City assistant police chief who was Assistant Director in charge of NCIS's REACT – Regional Enforcement Action and Capabilities Training – special forces teams. "If security is what I think it is, Director, I honestly don't think a REACT team would be enough."

"Speak up," Drake replied. He used that term whenever he wanted someone to get to the point.

"If POTUS is overseeing these…camps, and wanted to keep anyone who came through in those camps, he has to have some form of heightened security in place. Security against supervillains, criminal gangs-"

"Wayward federal agencies?" Drake replied.

"I didn't say _that_ , sir," Larkin replied, with a curt smile. "I'm thinking more to keep a stadium of people in – and that's going to take some heavy-duty, military-grade security. If that's the case – and you have to assume POTUS has something in place – you might need to call in more firepower."

"You're not talking about the Marines, either, are you Michael?", Mosley asked.

"I'm thinking of a certain man with a red cape who is, ah, more likely to believe Director Drake over the Commander in Chief," Larkin said.

"I know and assume the risks," Drake said. "Remember, no one – Luthor, Crawford, Sarah Porter – has told us not to undertake this operation."

"And what if they do?" Mosley said.

"We'll cross that bridge when we get to it," Drake said. "I want to review the non-NCIS part of our joint operation while Mr. Bones is here with us. Bones, any word from your people in RFK over the last 30 minutes?"

"I think Mr. Larkin is onto something, Maurice. They're probably dressed in FEMA garb—"

 **3:57 p.m. EDT**

 **Washington**

 **11** **th** **Street SE**

Carl Long drove his Corvette north just a tad above the speed limit, with Remy Gautreau riding shotgun. At a red light, Long tapped the screen on the car's audio player. "Siri, play Playlist #7."

" _Playing Playlist #7,"_ the female AI voice replied, and in moments the sounds of John Coltrane's _Alabama_ piece filled the car.

"What in heck _is_ that, _homme_?", Gautreau asked.

"Don't tell me you've never heard of Coltrane," Long said.

"I've heard of Coltrane. I grew up in New Orleans, remember? But _Coltrane_ on the way to a case? Homme, _Dwayne Pride's_ from there like I am, and _he_ doesn't do that." Gautreau had recently transferred back to the NCIS field office at Camp Lejeune in North Carolina from the New Orleans office led by Pride.

"Coltrane calms me down, helps me focus. It's something I started doing after I finished Agent Afloat duty and started working in Silverdale." Long's NCIS career trajectory took him from Singapore to the USS Independence to Silverdale, Washington, and eventually to Washington. "You play music on the way to a case or a crime scene?"

"Not _that_."

"What about Coburn? He have you playing Kirk Franklin?"

Gautreau chuckled. "Commander's not _that_ hands on, homme. He usually doesn't have anything on if he's driving on the job. There _was_ that one time. Somebody called Philips, Craig and Dean. _Homme_ …"

"Not your scene?" Long said with a chuckle as he took a right onto Independence Avenue SE, a straight shot to RFK.

"No. If I had to play music, it'd be Jay-Z or Drake. Or one of those country songs Shel likes to play. Luke Bryan. At least it has a beat, gets you going."

"Wanna _hear_ Luke Bryan?" Long offered.

"Heck no," Gautreau replied with a laugh. "Save that for those special occasions with Shel and his dog, when we're about to take down a drug dealer or rogue Marine or a redneck terrorist."

"' _Heck'_? Doesn't quite sound like something you'd say, man."

"That's the Commander rubbing off on me. He doesn't like cursing. Goes against one of his rules. He doesn't proselytize you if you're on his team, but does hold you to certain stand—hey, isn't that Conners?"

The two men saw a black Firebird speeding past them down Independence with its lights blaring. "Should've known Leadfoot couldn't wait to get to the scene," Long said as the car darted through traffic.

 **4 p.m. EDT**

 **Independence Ave SE and 16** **th** **Street**

Agent Brooke Conners and Agent Carl Long had one thing in common: they both preferred playing music on the way to a case. Their musical choices were very different.

Conners liked her car windows down, the wind flowing through her short, blonde hair, and classic rock blaring from the speakers. Whoever was in the passenger seat – like Agent Ned Dorneget – had one choice: enjoy it. As fast as 'Leadfoot' liked to drive, they wouldn't have to endure it for long if the case was in D.C. (If the case was further out – Joint Base Norfolk; rural West Virginia; or Metropolis – one simply made the best of it).

Dorneget was 'enjoying' the sounds of Led Zeppelin, one of Conners' favorite bands and not one of his.

"You think we'll have to park far away?", Dorneget asked.

'Dorney' was assigned to the team six years ago, and quickly overcame his 'nerdy first impression' (as Julie put it) and proved himself as the team's cyber and computer specialist. He also had proven to be a good hand in the field, and found a kindred spirit in Katie Yates (who, like Dorneget, is gay), Conners (who took him in like a younger brother) and Long (his complete opposite in many ways, and a buddy regardless).

"Nope," she said. "We're NCIS."

Conners was a free spirit, assigned to the MCRT in June 2008 after two team members were murdered in Miami on a joint operation with the Miami-Dade Police Department's Crime Scene Investigations unit. Conners had since proven to be a solid field agent and loyal to her new team – so loyal she turned down two offers to lead teams of her own. She was also outspoken, and her opinions had gotten her in hot water more than once with those way above her pay grade – like Clayton Jarvis, the former Secretary of the Navy.

Her Firebird sped down Independence, past the old National Guard Armory. She saw the first roadblocks well before she hit the brakes to avoid hitting the National Guard vehicles in the road.

"You NCIS?" the National Guard officer asked after Conners rolled down her window. She and Dorneget showed the woman their badges. "Nobody told us not to let you in so…park in the Blue Lot."

Conners waited for Long's Corvette, which was tailed by a silver Ford Expedition SUV. She looked in her rearview mirror – ignoring the Guard officer's repeated requests to go into the complex – and saw Commander Coburn driving the SUV with two other members of his team.

"They're with me," Conners said, just before she put her foot on the pedal and sped away into the parking lot.

 **4:06 p.m. EDT**

 **RFK Stadium**

"Wanna level with you," Gibbs told Katie, as she waited in line in the concourse behind 27 women, all needing to use the women's rest room. "My people and I want to get outta here."

 _Good thing nobody else heard you say that_ , she thought. Katie lingered about 12 feet behind the last person in line, a middle-school-aged girl.

She took a moment to take in the fact she was talking with someone who wasn't, and yet was in his own way, the legendary Leroy Jethro Gibbs who died in the line 12 years ago. Katie would've tried to kick him in the balls or the knees and ran by now, had her gut not reassured her he was a good person, albeit insistent on getting his way as far as leaving the facility.

Gibbs, even now, lingered as a larger-than-life figure around NCIS. Books had been written about his life, documentaries made about him and dozens of stories had been compiled on him by reporters; much about his life had long since been made a matter of public record, but there were so many mysteries that opened up whenever a story was told. Some of those mysteries were caused by unsubstantiated rumors on social media — why let the truth get in the way of a great story? — and some of them were true, their truths hidden from the public.

Katie looked back, years ago, when the woman she thought was the love of her life turned out to be a plant by the matriarch of a Mexican drug cartel, designed to get her to verify a weapon owned by a dead NCIS legend was used to murder the matriarch's father. The violence involved in recovering her from the cartel's 'safe house' in Virginia didn't bother her; it was the answer to her question to Director Vance: "What will you do with that report?" She hadn't seen it since, and for all she knew Vance might have buried it among a pile of cold cases, or tossed it in a fireplace, or shredded it and flushed the mulch down the commode.

 _That_ , not the psychological trauma caused by her lover's betrayal nor the sight of seeing her teammates gun down the thugs holding her hostage, caused her to lose so much of the innocence that charmed Marcus and Julie, Gerald, Greg and Barbie and, later, Brooke and Dwayne, when she dared to step into the pig-tails of the departed Abby Sciuto. Sure, the smiley faces and silly sayings ('Love Is All Around') were still all over the lab, and she still blared her 'happy music' at full volume, but Katherine Dawn Yates' inner child had grown up.

When something came up to remind her of her 'bad day', she usually walked away from it. Well, here was a living, breathing reminder of that incident, and she sure couldn't walk away from this — he wouldn't let her. She saw his people on the field, and they all looked like they could be the people who were killed by Ari Haswari 12 years ago — except for Stan Burley, whom she knew was alive.

The line to the women's room hadn't moved. She and Gibbs both heard faint whimpers from inside; she wanted to go in and see if she could help, but she _really_ had to go pee. If she left now, she'd have enough time to flash her badge past the guards and get into the FEMA-controlled luxury suite section. Gibbs wouldn't follow her inside, but he wasn't going to go away, either, and if he'd wait patiently outside, she'd take care of one problem so she could take care of his.

"Come with me," she said to Gibbs, and they made their way up the stairs 50 feet away to one of the entrances to the suites. The guard started to say something to them, but Katie flashed her NCIS badge and said 'get out of my way, I gotta _pee_!"

"You'll have to wait here," Katie told Gibbs. "Give me ten minutes."

Inside the ladies' room, she took the nearest stall, and did her business. While washing her hands, she heard a voice from the other stall ask "what's he like?".

Katie's head whipped around and she reached for the palm-sized stunner hidden under her shirt. When the occupant opened the stall door, she had the weapon pointed right at him; her eyebrows shot up once she recognized him, and she bit her tongue to keep from yelling at the man.

"LARRY! _What_ in the _world_ are you _doing_!?"

A short, slender, thirty-something man of Indian descent stepped out, hands held up. His name was Kartik Viswanathan and he was a special agent with the Department of Extranormal Operations who had worked with the MCRT on several occasions. Katie — and the rest of her team — called the usually well-dressed, cocky, mischievous agent by his preferred nickname Larry, and he often socialized with them off-hours. Larry sometimes got on Katie's nerves, but they were good friends — although not good enough for her to overlook his being in the ladies' room.

"Sorry, babe," Larry said with a smile and a wink. "I'm on the job—"

"That's not part of your job!", she said, thrusting her forefinger at the stall he had stepped out from. "What on Earth are you doing in there?"

"Watching your back," he said, and she then noticed he was dressed in the same FEMA collared shirt and khakis she and the other 'volunteers' were dressed in. "There's some crazy shit going down—"

Katie stormed over to Larry, grabbed him by his collar and — over his protests — pushed him back into the stall, then locked the door behind her.

"Whoa _now_ , Kates," he said, using a portmanteau of her first and last names. "I _swear_ I'm on the job—"

"You better be, buddy," she shot back, although she figured by then he was telling the truth. "You couldn't talk to me _outside_? And watch your mouth."

"Sorry," he said, and she let go of his collar. "They've got eyes all over this place," he said.

"' _They'_?"

"Yup."

Katie rolled her eyes; she made sure he would never live this incident down in either of their lifetimes. "And who _are_ 'they'?"

"Uh…"

"Uh what?"

"Uh, as in, _we_ , as in the DEO, don't know who _they_ are. Yet."

Katie glared at him for several moments, then thought of Gibbs and the possibility the old man might be outside right then, or sending for someone like Kate Todd — or Ziva David — to make sure she didn't get lost. "So they, whoever 'they' are, are watching us—"

"You, the people. Gibbs. Look, Kates, we heard chatter about something like today going down, and some group trying to round up people without anyone hearing about it. The media, the feds like us, the military, the Justice League. That got blown all to hell today, so now we think they're working on their Plan B."

"Any idea what this 'Plan B' might be?"

"No, not yet, but Mr. B figured if we have anyone of interest cross over, get to them before 'they' do." Katie knew 'Mr. B' as the DEO Director, Mr. Bones, whom she once called a 'living, icky skeleton' due to the man's skeleton being the only visible thing about him besides the suits he wore (along with the cigarettes he always smoked). "Mr. B knows Gibbs are here, and said to assume other people do, too."

"You think 'they' are super villains? Russians? Chinese? Khunds? Terrorists?" Larry shrugged his shoulders. "Government?"

Larry didn't shrug his shoulders. "Maybe. The bugs I found are ones that used to be used by the CIA back in the day. Got one in an evidence bag in my pocket. We're gonna look at it when I get back."

"Why couldn't you wait outside," she sighed.

"One, if that guy is like the Gibbs I read about, he'd be worse to get through than Batman. Two, whoever 'they' are, they didn't have time to put bugs everywhere. They didn't bug the restrooms — we don't _think_ they did anyway. This is the safest place to talk to you."

"You think this was a rush job?", she asked. "That entire operation outside took months to organize—"

"Yeah, but the bugs are scattered, like someone had hours notice and put them wherever."

"Darn it…speaking of Gibbs, I'd say his 'Bug sense' is on override," she said. "I better get back out there."

"It's his gut, Katie. Same thing Julie talks about all the time. I'd thought you had known that—"

"I know what a gut is, Larry," she said. "Mine is telling me he's losing his mind by now. Just get behind me, I'll tell him you're with me, and we'll work on the plan he and I figured out."

"Which is?"

"Wait for Marcus and Julie."

"Just tell me where the explosion is so I can hide behind the furthest wall."

"Oh my gosh! It was the freakin' Clock King, Larry. Not somebody like Bane…come on."

Elsewhere in the stands, a man in FEMA clothing watched the crowd with a pair of binoculars; two minutes later, he saw Katie, Larry and Gibbs step back outside and make their way down towards the field.

He pulled out a smartphone and dialed a number; "Targets are on the move," he said.

"The window of opportunity is closing fast," said a woman on the other line. "Whatever you're going to do, get it done. The NCIS people are on the premises."

"Copy that," the man said.


	6. Chapter 5

**Chapter 5**

 **Tuesday, June 5, 2017**

 **4:20 p.m. EDT**

 _-footage from a drone over International Harvester Field at Central City University showed what we guess are between 30 to 35,000 people in the stadium. The footage includes the drone being shot down and landing in the parking lot. It's being posted on apps like YouTube and Twitter twice as fast as it's being taken down—_

 _-ESPN is reporting FEMA has told Major League Baseball and Major League Soccer to prepare alternative venues for some of their teams to play in over the next few months-_

 _-I'd like to ask Luthor, Congress, the Justice League, anybody in power: where have all these people come from?—_

 _-White House Chief of Staff Mercy's five-word text to reporters asking any question related to the developing situation: 'Wait until the President speaks'—_

 _-FEMA is not responding to any media requests for comment-_

 _-I've told you for months the government was going to do something like this and not enough of you listened to me because you listened to the lamestream media telling you people like me are insane. Well, WHO'S INSANE NOW, HUH?! The aliens are HERE. Let me say it again. Slooowwwlllyy. The. ALIENS. Are. HERE!-_

 **Washington**

 **RFK Stadium**

 _Something's very wrong here,_ Gibbs thought as he waited in the concourse area that was gradually filling up with people looking for shade from the afternoon sun.

He listened in on parts of various conversations amongst the people: concern over loved ones and friends, and talk that they might not be where they thought they _should_ be. Both, especially the latter, were understandable under the circumstances; Gibbs had heard people going through the Pentagon ring ask what in hell the ring was and where it was taking them. No one with any apparent affiliation to an official government or law enforcement agency said _anything_ , much less the truth: the ring was a wormhole taking them to a parallel Earth in another dimension.

The FEMA and stadium security personnel here weren't saying anything of substance, either, just telling people everything was going to be okay while handing out bottled water and boxed lunches. Gibbs overheard people talking about that quite a bit. He hadn't heard anyone talk about getting out of the stadium, but he assumed it was just a matter of time – hours – before someone _did_ something.

Gibbs wasn't certain he wanted to be here when that happened.

That's where he thought he had an advantage – if the young woman currently hiding in the women's restroom close by was with her version of NCIS, he and his people _already_ had an important connection. As soon as she got out, he was going to gently press her to contact her team and her director to get them out of this stadium.

Out of the corner of his right eye, he saw Katie walk out the entrance to the suites with a man right behind her. She saw and acknowledged him with a wave. Gibbs waved back and took note of her body language and composure; she was calm and walked towards him quickly, and was completely comfortable with the man who had hurried to walk besides her. That told him he was at the very least a colleague and not an immediate threat.

"Gibbs, this is my friend Larry," Katie said, as the Indian-American man who was her height – he was 5 feet, 6 inches tall to Katie's 5 feet 5 inches – gaped at him.

After a few awkward moments, Gibbs thought a light, firm headslap might be in order. He smiled when Katie delivered a light, but firm, elbow to his side; he then remembered her earlier comment in the stands about Kate's sister helping run the local MCRT and wondered what else the young woman might have interited from her team's predecessors.

"This is Larry," Katie said, "and he's a friend. He's with the D.E.O. Show him your badge, Larry."

"Uh, sorry, Mr. Gibbs—", Larry said before Gibbs interrupted him.

"Call me Gibbs," Gibbs said as Larry pulled out his badge and ID. "You're with the DEA?"

"D.E.O., for Department of Extranormal Operations," Larry said. "We investigate aliens, superhumans, ghosts, demons, that sort of stuff. You wouldn't believe some of the things we check out."

"Fill me in later," Gibbs told Larry as he turned to Katie. "Katie, I don't think it's gonna be long before the lid blows off this place—"

"You think?", Larry interjected. "Tension's thick—" Larry shut up right as Gibbs locked eyes on him with his legendary glare.

"—and I honestly want to be out of here with my people at NCIS," Gibbs continued, as he addressed Katie. "My gut tells me that's the best place for us to be. I trust them – I trust you – more than anyone else on this planet right now besides my own people. Can _your_ people get us out or not?"

A few nearby eavesdroppers perked up. "I'd rather have this conversation out there," she whispered, nodding her head towards the suite entrance. "Follow me."

Katie jogged towards the suite entrance, Gibbs right behind her and Larry trailing him; she showed the guards her NCIS badge, said the two men were with her, and all three were let in. They made their way through the suites to the exit that led outside into the stadium, then headed towards the field.

 **Navy Yard**

 **NCIS Headquarters**

 **MTAC**

 **4:33 p.m.**

" _I'm sorry, sir, Administrator Manning is unavailable right now due to a developing situation."_

Drake groaned loudly. Was a deputy as high as he could get with the FEMA hierarchy right now? Latisha Andrews – the Deputy Administrator for the Office of Response and Recovery – didn't seem inclined to help Drake in any way.

 _Maybe if I tell her what I know about the 'developing situation'_ , Drake thought, _I might get somewhere._ "You're referring to the situation at RFK: tens of thousands of people from another dimension FEMA is helping feed and shelter."

On the big screen inside MTAC, Andrews's eyes grew wide briefly before she caught herself and went back to her polite, smiling demeanor. _"Director Drake, there are restrictions in place in regards to information on current FEMA activities being given to outside—"_

"NCIS is a _federal_ agency, Deputy Andrews, just like your own," Drake said. "I need to speak to Administrator Manning. Is he available or not?"

Andrews looked off screen for a few moments and though Drake saw her speaking to someone off camera, her feed had gone silent. _"I'm sorry, Director Drake, you don't have the proper clearance. Your agency will be given the appropriate information in due time. If you will excuse me, I need to attend to agency business. Thank you."_

Drake cursed to himself as the NCIS logo replaced the feed from FEMA on the big screen. "Marianne," he said to a nearby tech, "get the Secretary of Defense on the line, please. Secure line, Gold Clearance…but not here. In my office."

"Yes, sir," the young tech said. Three minutes later, Drake had locked down his office and secured it as best he could. He picked his phone up and called MTAC. "Patch him through, please."

A minute later, the image of Wynn Crawford, the current Secretary of Defense, appeared on screen. _"Maurice, I'm surprised it took you so long to call. It's turned out to be a busy day."_

"We're secure, Mr. Secretary. No outsiders," Drake said, although he knew that wasn't entirely true. "I've been in contact with Agent Stewart and Miss Yates. We know RFK Stadium is full of refugees from the alternate Earth. We also know who some of them are specifically. They're…alternates, sir, of NCIS personnel who were killed in 2005."

" _Those people?"_

"Spitting images. Makes me wonder who might want them and why."

Drake filled in Crawford with everything he knew so far. "I have two teams on the ground there and they're getting locked out. FEMA's got control of the situation there but they've got help. My theory is they're using private contractors that the Horne and Bush administrations used in Qurac, Afghanistan, and Iraq."

" _Not a bad theory, Director. Some of those contractors' connections probably go pretty deep and high, as high as it gets. You've heard of the saying 'count the cost'? I understand your reasons for wanting in there, but you might want to let the Big Man handle this."_

Drake bit his lower lip. "Mr. Secretary, have you heard of the saying 'brother from a different mother'?"

" _Vaguely, probably from a movie."_

"Those people I'm talking about in RFK are our _own_ , sir. They're not from this planet, they've never been deputized by this agency, they've never sworn allegiance to _our_ country. But they _are_ NCIS, they _are_ federal agents, and have sworn allegiance to the United States. Leaving them at the mercy of…whomever…would be wrong. NCIS is NCIS, and we do _not_ turn our back on our own."

" _Are you asking for my permission to go get them or are you giving me a heads up, Maurice?"_

"I'm asking if you'll back my play, sir," Drake continued. "And to pull a few strings. You still have a connection to one of those contractors, right?"

" _I see you've done your homework."_

"Can you get them to create an entrance and exit our people can sneak through, get in and out?"

" _I can…see if a former associate or two can do a favor for me,"_ Crawford said. _"You better have a Plan B, Maurice. That stadium is locked down tight. Even if I got your people in, there's no guarantee some of the other security wouldn't seal that entrance up."_

"So they can't get in on the ground level."

" _Probably not."_

"What about the sky?"

"That's _your Plan B, Director?"_

"Sometimes you have to think outside the box, sir," Drake said. "I have an idea."

"As long as it doesn't blow back on your agency – or this office," Crawford replied. "You'll probably answer to the Big Man. But I can spin it as NCIS wanting to avoid a repeat of the Earth-3 fiasco."

"Great minds think alike, sir. Before you ask, I don't think these folks are cut from that cloth."

" _Let's hope so. Whatever you do, you need to do it now. Have you read the debrief you were emailed a little while ago?"_

"Skimmed through it. I know their world was in a war about to go nuclear. I imagine they're scared and confused, and probably have the clothes on their backs and not much else."

" _That's a potent combination for disaster, Maurice. Whatever you do, do it quickly. And keep me in the loop."_

The spinning NCIS logo replaced Crawford's image on the big screen in Drake's office. The director walked back to his desk, sat down in his chair and sighed. He opened his email inbox again, and pulled up the file sent to him from Crawford's office.

 _Refugees from a world that they can never return to because the bastards have blown it to hell by now,_ Drake thought. He called up his contacts on his cell phone and patched in Stewart, Julie and Coburn on a four-way call.

 **Washington**

 **D.C. Armory**

 **4:48 p.m.**

"Nice of them to save us a spot," Conners said after she pulled her Firebird into the parking lot of the 66-year-old D.C. Armory.

She and Dorneget got out next to the Expedition driven by Coburn. They, along with Agent Maggie Foley and Petty Officer Third Class Estrella Montoya – both subordinate to Coburn and part of his Camp Lejeune-based team – met Long and Gautreau at Long's Corvette. Three men and one woman, all armed with submachine guns and semi-automatic weapons, and dressed in black uniforms covered in black body armor, kept a close eye on the NCIS agents.

RFK Stadium – the venue the agents really wanted to be at – was well within visual and walking distance of the Armory parking lot.

The NCIS personnel stood at their vehicles and looked out at the fleet of vehicles patrolling the Armory and RFK lots that had seemingly tripled within the last 15 minutes. They noted more security personnel were on foot everywhere in the immediate area, including the roadblocks heading into the stadium. And, after an armed security officer in a Jeep made it clear to the agents that they had to park at the Armory lot by waving his Uzi, they had no doubt someone wanted them to stay out of the stadium.

"We might as well have parked in Norfolk," Montoya said.

Gautreau smiled at two security personnel who walked 12 feet away and was met with glares.

"My math teacher in middle school always told me that you smile at someone, they'll smile back," Long said. "She never met those guys."

"They're on the job, Agent Long," Coburn said. "What I want to know is, what job is it they're doing and for whom."

Montoya looked to her left and to her right, and saw more security personnel in the distance, looking their way. "They're not going to make it easy to look around."

"You thinking about challenging that, Commander?", Conners said. "I'm up for a tussle."

"You're not alone, Brooke," Long said. "What's our play, sir? We still waiting for Marcus and Julie?"

"We are, Agent Long," Coburn said. "D.C.'s your team's turf and they're in charge. My team and I are here to support you."

"Speaking of us, have you heard from Shel?", said Foley, asking about the other member of Coburn's team in Washington: Gunnery Sergeant Sheldon McHenry, USMC.

"He and Max are en route, probably trying to get through those blasted roadblocks," Coburn replied. Max was a black Labrador dog who McHenry often referred to as a fellow Marine; the two had been inseparable for years, and Coburn couldn't remember a time when Max wasn't part of the squad.

"So we wait," Dorneget said. "When you spoke to Marcus and Julie, Commander, did they tell you what vehicle they were coming in?"

"All Agent Stewart said was 'unconventional', Agent Dorneget. They're both on audio silence right now at their request."

"Makes sense," Foley interjected. "We still don't know who these people are. There's no telling what kind of bugs they have."

Coburn discretely tapped on his left pec. The other agents nodded, confirming they each had the dime-sized scrambler devices attached somewhere on their persons. The devices were invented by S.T.A.R. Labs for the CIA in the 1990s, and various versions were commonly used by all federal and military intelligence agencies, usually in covert operations.

Since the agents were going into a situation with a lot of unknown elements, Director Drake authorized use of the scramblers on this case. If they did their job – and the security didn't have technology that would render them useless – the scramblers should allow the team to securely communicate with each other in the field.

"What do you think's in there, Boss?", Gautreau asked Coburn, pointing his thumb to the Armory right behind them.

The building, opened months before the United States entered the Second World War, currently was used primarily as a 10,000-seat sports and entertainment arena and secondarily as the armory for the District of Columbia National Guard.

"Overflow for whomever's running security at the stadium," Coburn replied. "Got that much out of the guards. I _would_ like to know what exactly _is_ in there."

"If you decide you want to start trouble, Commander, I'll light the fuse for you," Conners said. "Remember Markovia?"

"I know I remember it. Loud and clear," shouted McHenry 10 feet away from the group.

Conners beat out Long in getting to the large Marine and his canine partner, Max. "You snuck up on us, Shel," she said, as Long and McHenry exchanged a bro hug.

"Snuck up on _you_ , _chere_ , not _us_ ," Gautreau added, as Estrella giggled and Foley gave a wink and a smile. "Where's _my_ hug at, _homme_?" Max ran straight up to Gautreau and gave him a solid lick on the jaw, causing the Louisianan to wince and chuckle, and the rest of the group to laugh.

Coburn looked on and smiled. His team and the Washington MCRT had a great rapport, partly because they had worked together more in the last 12 years than any other combination of teams within NCIS. They had closed several cases and brought a dozen criminals to justice.

That cooperation went back to the days of the Siege, shortly after Coburn's appointment to the experimental military-only team based out of Camp Lejeune in North Carolina. He was drafted by then-Director Jenny Shepard to be part of a team assigned to bring Ari Haswari to justice. Coburn, Stewart and Todd went through the wringer together that summer in 2005, and had earned each other's respect and trust as a result. While Stewart and Todd took over the Washington Major Case Response Team from the late Leroy Jethro Gibbs, Coburn returned to Camp Lejeune and took command of his team, intended to be the first of several teams consisting mainly of military personnel.

Coburn's team was the first and, so far, only one of those teams to get off the ground; men and women way above his pay grade decided NCIS should continue to recruit its agents from the civilian ranks, although Coburn's team could continue to do the good work it had done from its beginning. The Commander retained his Navy rank as agreed upon by the Secretary of the Navy and the late NCIS Director Thomas Morrow. He ran the team while trying to keep his marriage and raise a family, and he determined to grow in his Christian faith.

The 'Navy NCIS' team closed case after case, brought dozens of criminals to justice and took down several foreign and domestic threats to the Navy and Marine Corps. The team became highly respected throughout and outside of NCIS. But Coburn lost his marriage, and went through some rough patches with his son and, later, his daughter before more recently mending things up with them both.

He wasn't sure what the future held. He was offered a position on the Navy's spacecarrier U.S.S. Nimitz, and a spot on Congressman Greg Laurie's staff. But Coburn felt that God wasn't done with him yet in NCIS, that something big was about to break and God wanted him in on it.

 _Is this it, Lord?_ Coburn silently prayed, as he often did every so often during downtime on the job. _I always thought you might put me in the path of the Justice League. Maybe you wanted me to talk with the people in that stadium, instead?_ Coburn had been informally cautioned on his proselytizing throughout his tenure at NCIS, but tried not to follow the example of the media evangelists who advocated shoving Christ down everyone's throat, sending the Rannians back to Alpha Centauri and the superheroes (and villains) back to Hell.

I've prayed and witnessed and befriended everyone here, Marcus and Julie and their team and my own, Lord, Coburn prayed. It's easier with regular people than with super people, or aliens. Or people who are other versions of the most famous deceased people in the history of the NCIS. Coburn looked around, and noticed the ranks of the security forces were growing. Lord, we can't do much here. We need to get in that stadium. Please make a way where there seems to be no way.

He heard the faint sounds of helicopters that became louder as the seconds ticked by. The security forces, along with the NCIS agents, looked upwards and saw the source of those sounds: a dozen Marine helicopters in tight formation, headed towards the Armory.

Three helicopters – a Sikorsky CH-53E Super Stallion heavy lift vehicle, flanked by two AH-1W SuperCobra attack copters – descended to within 15 feet of the parking lot and directly over the NCIS agents' positions.

Stewart and Todd both leaned out the passenger door behind the cockpit and lowered a ladder and a dog harness.

"You want a ride?", Stewart yelled.

"Where's my tank?", Coburn yelled back.

"We're Navy, Commander. We don't do tanks," Stewart yelled back. "You have to know that by now."

" _This_ is your plan?"

"Will you knuckleheads stop arguing and get everybody on the helicopter?" Todd interjected, trying not to smile. "All of you. Get up here. The harness is for the dog, Brooke, not for Bessy."

"She deserves her own harness, don't you, girl?", Conners said, patting the Sig-Sauer semi-automatic pistol secured in the holster attached to her right hip. "We flying in there?"

"Gotta get the party started, girl," Stewart said. "Let's go!"


End file.
